95 percent of scientific experiments involving a lab animal use rats or mice as their subjects. Now, researchers in Japan have figured out how to make a mouse’s body almost completely see-through.
95 percent of scientific experiments involving a lab animal use mice or rats as their subjects.
Now, researchers in Japan have figured out how to make a mouse’s body almost completely see-through.
By removing color from the mouse’s tissue, the skin and organs become transparent, so they can be studied without dissection.
The study included experts from the research institute RIKEN, the University of Tokyo and the Japan Science and Technology Agency.
Haem is a compound that is in most bodily tissue and is responsible for giving blood its color.
Pumping saline solution through the mouse’s body, starting in the heart, removed the animal’s blood.
Then, the body of the mouse was soaked in a reagent that separates the heme from haemoglobin.
The study leader is quoted as saying: "It could lead to the achievement of one of our great dreams: organism-level systems biology based on whole-body imaging at single-cell resolution."
Another study from researchers at the California Institute of Technology also developed a method for making lab rats and mice translucent.
Both studies were performed to create a map of mouse anatomy as a way to better understand neuronal networks, or study the development of certain diseases.
