If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.

Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm


Never mind. I suppose someone has to do the donkey work :-)


Angus Macmillan
www.roots-of-blood.org.uk
www.killhunting.org
www.con-servation.org.uk

All truth passes through three stages:
First, it is ridiculed;
Second, it is violently opposed; and
Third, it is accepted as self-evident. 
-- Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

On Sat, 26 Jan 2008 23:13:02 +0000, amacmil304@aol.com wrote:

>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
>rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>
>Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>
>http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>
>
>Never mind. I suppose someone has to do the donkey work :-)

I don't think he's even qualified for that! LOL


Animal testers seek alternative to rats 

By Michael Hill, Associated Press
TROY, N.Y. — The lab rat of the future may have no whiskers and no
tail — or even be a rat at all.
With a European ban on animal testing for cosmetics looming, companies
are giving a hard look at high-tech alternatives like the small,
rectangular glass chip professor Jonathan Dordick holds up to the
light in his lab at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

The chip looks like a standard microscope slide, but it holds hundreds
of tiny white dots loaded with human cell cultures and enzymes. It's
designed to mimic human reactions to potentially toxic chemical
compounds, meaning critters like rats and mice may no longer need to
be on the front line of tests for new blockbuster drugs or wrinkle
creams.

Dordick and fellow chemical engineering professor Douglas Clark of the
University of California, Berkeley lead a team of researchers planning
to market the chip through their company, Solidus Biosciences, by next
year. Hopes are high that the chip and other "in vitro" tests —
literally, tests in glass — will provide cheaper, efficient
alternatives to animal testing. No one expects the chips to totally
replace animals just yet, but their ability to flag toxins could spare
animals discomfort or death.

"At the end of the day, you have fewer animals being tested," said
Dordick.

Medical advances ranging from polio vaccines to artificial heart
valves owe a debt to anonymous legions of lab rats, mice, rabbits,
dogs monkeys and pigs. Animals — mostly mice — are still routinely
used to test the toxicity of chemical compounds. Taylor Bennett,
senior science advisor to the National Association for Biomedical
Researchers, said animal testing maintains an essential role in making
sure new pharmaceutical products are safe and effective for humans.

Studies with animals are generally needed before the federal Food and
Drug Administration will approve clinical trials for a drug.

"The technology is not yet there to go from idea to patient
application without using animals," Bennett said.

But animal testing can be slow and some researchers question how well
a creature's physical response to a chemical can predict human
reactions. Meanwhile, the public has become increasingly queasy about
animal testing, especially the idea of inflicting pain to clear the
way for the likes of new lipsticks or eye shadows. The movement
against animal testing has been especially strong across the Atlantic,
where the European Union is set to enact its ban on animal testing for
cosmetics in March 2009.

Cosmetics companies have greatly reduced the amount of animal testing,
though they still may use it to test the safety of a new ingredient,
said John Bailey, executive vice president of the Personal Care
Products Council, an industry group.

Still, cosmetic companies that plan to offer new products to the
lucrative European market must soon find a suitable replacement for
animals. Alternatives range from synthetic skin substitutes or
computer simulations. But in vitro products show the most promise
because they can are efficient, fast and easy to manipulate, said Dr.
Alan Goldberg, director of the Center for Alternatives to Animal
Testing at Johns Hopkins University.

"There's no question that it's the strategy of the future," Goldberg
said.

Bailey agrees that in vitro chips hold the most promise among animal
testing alternatives, but he added that the chips still need to be
validated before companies can have more confidence in them. He noted
that chips have limitations when it comes to risk assessment, such as
determining if particular doses of a substance pose a cancer risk.

"In the long term, I think this is probably the direction that most
testing will go in," said Bailey of the cosmetic industry group. "That
said, there is a considerable amount of research that needs to be done
before we get from here to there."

The product developed by Dordick and Clark consists of two glass
slides. The first, called the MetaChip, has uniform rows of little
blots containing human liver enzymes. The other slide, the DataChip,
contains an identical array of blots which, depending on the test,
could be growing human liver, bladder, kidney, heart, skin or lung
cell cultures. Sandwiched together, the two chips mimic the human
body's reaction to compounds.

If the cells inside die or stop growing, it's a sign that a toxin was
introduced.

About $3 million in federal money, including grants from the National
Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, has gone to
Troy, N.Y.-based Solidus. Dordick said a pharmaceutical and a cosmetic
company are testing the chip now and they hope Solidus will have a
product on the market by late 2009.

While the chip won't replace animal testing, Dordick said it can be
used early in the testing process to weed out toxins that will not
have to be tested on animals in later stages.

Goldberg notes that the movements toward in vitro and away from animal
testing is incremental — even optimistic assessments measure progress
in decades. But he still believes there may well be a day when the lab
rat becomes a thing of the past.

"At some time in the far future my suspicion is yes," he said,
"because were doing it stepwise by stepwise."

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 07:43:27 +0000, Malcolm
 wrote:

>
>In article , 
>amacmil304@aol.com writes
>>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
>>rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>>
>>Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>>
>>http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>>
>Several years away yet, it seems, but very much worth pursuing.
>>
>>Never mind. I suppose someone has to do the donkey work :-)

>I don't think there's much drug testing on donkeys, so you seem to be 
>muddled, as usual!

That counts you out then, I knew you didn't have the qualifications.

In article , 
amacmil304@aol.com writes
>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
>rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>
>Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>
>http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>
Several years away yet, it seems, but very much worth pursuing.
>
>Never mind. I suppose someone has to do the donkey work :-)
>
I don't think there's much drug testing on donkeys, so you seem to be 
muddled, as usual!

-- 
Malcolm

On Jan 27, 8:43 am, Malcolm  wrote:
> In article ,
> amacmil...@aol.com writes>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
> >rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>
> >Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>
> >http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>
> Several years away yet, it seems, but very much worth pursuing.

I think we can all say "Hooray" to that.

It means, too, that ARists will also benefit from formerly, animal-
tested drugs - which previously their ethical conviction prevented
them from taking, didn't it? All that will need to be done is to
retest the drugs without using animals and their consciences will be
cleared.

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 02:19:37 -0800 (PST), "John M."
 wrote:

>On Jan 27, 8:43 am, Malcolm  wrote:
>> In article ,
>> amacmil...@aol.com writes>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
>> >rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>>
>> >Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>>
>> >http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>>
>> Several years away yet, it seems, but very much worth pursuing.
>
>I think we can all say "Hooray" to that.
>
>It means, too, that ARists will also benefit from formerly, animal-
>tested drugs - which previously their ethical conviction prevented
>them from taking, didn't it?

And have the animals died in vain? I don't think so, we all benefit
from history thank you very much. If it had not been of the death and
destruction of millions of animals in the past some of us now may
never have seen the light. We might have ended up like you a waste of
space. Instead we learned we can do something about the world, and we
will.

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 08:36:44 +0000, Adam Hart  wrote:

>Animal testers seek alternative to rats 
>
>By Michael Hill, Associated Press
>TROY, N.Y. — The lab rat of the future may have no whiskers and no
>tail — or even be a rat at all.
>With a European ban on animal testing for cosmetics looming, companies
>are giving a hard look at high-tech alternatives ...

  If rats can't be used any more, then surely they could find some
Republicans to use instead. We could even send them some Tories
for experimental purposes.

-- 

Jim.

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 15:21:47 +0000, Jim 
wrote:

>On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 08:36:44 +0000, Adam Hart  wrote:
>
>>Animal testers seek alternative to rats 
>>
>>By Michael Hill, Associated Press
>>TROY, N.Y. — The lab rat of the future may have no whiskers and no
>>tail — or even be a rat at all.
>>With a European ban on animal testing for cosmetics looming, companies
>>are giving a hard look at high-tech alternatives ...
>
>  If rats can't be used any more, then surely they could find some
>Republicans to use instead. We could even send them some Tories
>for experimental purposes.

Hell we could even send a troll or two. Ogilvie will do anything for
money!

On Jan 27, 11:32 am, Adam Hart  wrote:
> On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 02:19:37 -0800 (PST), "John M."
>
>
>
>  wrote:
> >On Jan 27, 8:43 am, Malcolm  wrote:
> >> In article ,
> >> amacmil...@aol.com writes>If Malcolm Ogilvie was smart he'd be doing something like this -
> >> >rather than counting birds and "advising" Scottish Natural Heritage.
>
> >> >Could you not get anything better, Malcolm?
>
> >> >http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-01-25-ratalternatives_N.htm
>
> >> Several years away yet, it seems, but very much worth pursuing.
>
> >I think we can all say "Hooray" to that.
>
> >It means, too, that ARists will also benefit from formerly, animal-
> >tested drugs - which previously their ethical conviction prevented
> >them from taking, didn't it?
>
> And have the animals died in vain? I don't think so, we all benefit
> from history thank you very much. If it had not been of the death and
> destruction of millions of animals in the past some of us now may
> never have seen the light.

So that makes it all right does it, Pete? So why eschew meat from
animals that died in the past, but accept drugs tested on animals that
died in the past. Seems you want it both ways.

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 17:03:06 +0000, Adam Hart  wrote:

>On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 15:21:47 +0000, Jim 
>wrote:
>
>>On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 08:36:44 +0000, Adam Hart  wrote:
>>
>>>Animal testers seek alternative to rats 
>>>
>>>By Michael Hill, Associated Press
>>>TROY, N.Y. — The lab rat of the future may have no whiskers and no
>>>tail — or even be a rat at all.
>>>With a European ban on animal testing for cosmetics looming, companies
>>>are giving a hard look at high-tech alternatives ...
>>
>>  If rats can't be used any more, then surely they could find some
>>Republicans to use instead. We could even send them some Tories
>>for experimental purposes.
>
>Hell we could even send a troll or two. Ogilvie will do anything for
>money!

 Or of course the occasional "New" Labour minister ...

-- 

Jim.