Back to News <<Researchers help lab mice better reflect human genetic diversity

Date: May 30, 2011
From: FierceBiotech
Author: Howard Lovy

Let us take a moment to pay homage to the humble laboratory mouse. Without mice, much of the research covered on FierceBiotech Research could not take place, since we share 95 percent of our genes with our distant rodent cousins. For more than a century, selective breeding has produced today's mouse strains. But as it turns out, all of that selective breeding might not have been so good for either mice or men. And since we have bred diversity out of mice, it might be best if we introduced some new blood into the mix to reflect the genetic diversity of the human population, according to researchers.

Jackson Laboratory Professor Gary Churchill and Fernando Pardo-Manuel de Villena of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, created a high-resolution, genome-wide map of most of the mouse strains used in labs today. They found that "classical laboratory strains are derived from a few fancy mice with limited haplotype diversity." On the other hand, catch a few mice in the wild, and they "represent a deep reservoir of genetic diversity," the researchers write.

But don't just take their word for it. Geneticists are invited to take a look at the researchers' "Mouse Phylogeny Viewer," which "provides scientists with a visual tool where they can actually go and look at the genome of the mouse strains they are using or considering, compare the differences and similarities between strains and select the ones most likely to provide the basis for experimental results that can be more effectively extrapolated to the diverse human population," said Pardo-Manuel de Villena in a release.

The researchers have been helping geneticists move toward a better mouse for about a decade. In 2004, they launched the Collaborative Cross, which bred some wild-caught mice with the lab variety. The result was much more genetic diversity.

"This work creates a remarkable foundation for understanding the genetics of the laboratory mouse, a critical model for studying human health," James Anderson, who oversees bioinformatics grants at the National Institutes of Health, said in a release.