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Asked by anon-251339 on 21 Apr 2020.
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Martin Lindley answered on 21 Apr 2020:
Yes I have worked with mice and I am hoping to start a project with some new research collaborators to work with fruit flies.
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Anabel Martinez Lyons answered on 21 Apr 2020: last edited 21 Apr 2020 12:29 pm
Yes! In two different ways you could say.
I used to work in a marine biology lab where I studied how different ocean-living creatures are related genetically. To do this, I extracted DNA (genetic material) from shrimp, barnacles, crabs, snails, etc. that had been collected from different parts of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans to be able to ‘read’ the DNA code of each and study how similar the genetic code of one species was to another. It allowed us to create a map of where different sea creatures were found and how closely related their genes were to one another- because of the way ocean currents work, some species that were very genetically similar could be located very far away from one another!
Secondly, in my current job, I study mice that have liver tumours so that we can better understand how liver cancer form in humans. This is called an ‘animal model’ since instead of growing and studying tumours in people (which for lots of reasons isn’t ideal), we use animals to model (copy) the disease.
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Robert Ives answered on 21 Apr 2020:
I have spent most of my career studying and working with animals, although not in the wild. In my work, animals help us to learn whether new chemicals could help cure us from disease and become ‘medicines’ that save both the lives of humans and other animals. As part of my role, I also spend time to understand animal behaviour and how we can improve the lives of animals kept in laboratories. High animal welfare, providing toys, bedding, the right type of housing, allowing animals to ‘play’ together, etc all help make animals lives better and improves the quality of any experiments run using those animals.
I would loved to have studied animals in the wild and when I was at school, David Attenborough was one of my biggest heroes. There is only one David Attenborough, but there are lots of other opportunities to work with animals for those people who care about their welfare and want to make a real difference.
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Varun Ramaswamy answered on 21 Apr 2020:
I work with insect cells every week!
I use them to make the protein that I’m studying because they are incredible at making huge chunks if protein in the perfect way. -
Gabriela da Silva Xavier answered on 21 Apr 2020:
Yes I have. I work in diabetes research, and the manifestation of diabetes involves effects on multiple tissues. The effects of anti-diabetes drugs on different tissues needs to be studied in a systems context so I do some of my research using mice to look at the overall effects on the whole system. However, all of my projects start off with experimentation and observation in cells grown in dishes. When I have formed a hypothesis based on these initial observations that requires testing within a system, I move to a systems approach using mice.
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Donna MacCallum answered on 21 Apr 2020:
I work with mice to understand how infections happen and why people get ill when they get an infection. They also allow me to test new drugs to see if they are better to cure infections and save lives. However, we also work hard to make sure that our animals are kept in the best conditions and are treated the best that they can be… including retraining all staff to make sure that handle them in a way that stresses them out as little as possible.
At home I have lots of animals… a dog, two cats, hens (including chicks), ducks, turkeys, geese and a flight of budgies. I also have a rabbit who chooses to live free in our garden, but still comes to see us sometimes. -
Paige Chandler answered on 21 Apr 2020:
I work on mice every day. I use mice to study schizophrenia, since mice and humans are much more similar than you might imagine. I run behavioural tests with them, like challenging them with mazes and puzzles. Working with mice is very rewarding.
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Ozge Ozkaya answered on 22 Apr 2020:
Yes, I worked with fruitflies (Drosophila) and zebrafish. We used these animals as model systems to understand how certain biological events take place, how molecules interact with each other, how the brain works, and how muscles develop.
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Sophie Arthur answered on 23 Apr 2020:
I did do a project during university that was studying mouse brains
Comments
Sophie commented on :
At University I worked with fruit flies (Drosophila) – thousands of them! I was looking at how different genes caused them to have different characteristics (phenotypes) e.g. ridged wings, hairy backs, larger stomachs, different eye colours.