title: Validation of the rat limb bud micromass test in the international ECVAM validation study on three in vitro embryotoxicity tests.
abstract: A detailed report is presented on the performance of the rat limb bud micromass (MM) test in a European Centre for the Evaluation of Alternative Methods (ECVAM)-sponsored formal validation study on three in vitro tests for embryotoxicity. Twenty coded test chemicals, classified as non-embryotoxic, weakly embryotoxic or strongly embryotoxic on the basis of their in vivo effects on animals and/or humans, were tested in four laboratories. The outcome showed that the MM test is an experimentally validated test, which holds promise for use for identifying strongly embryotoxic chemicals, but which needs to be improved before it can be recommended for use for regulatory purposes.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Documentation and Evaluation of Alternative Methods to Animal Experiments (ZEBET) at the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR), Diedersdorfer Weg 1, 12277 Berlin, Germany. spielmann.zebet@bfr.bund.de
authors.forename: Horst
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Spielmann
authors.forename: Elke
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Genschow
authors.forename: Nigel A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.forename: Aldert H
authors.initials: AH
authors.lastname: Piersma
authors.forename: Aart
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Verhoef
authors.forename: Marielle Q I
authors.initials: MQ
authors.lastname: Spanjersberg
authors.forename: Hannele
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Huuskonen
authors.forename: Francoise
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Paillard
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Seiler
mesh_terms: D000826:Animal Testing Alternatives; D000818:Animals; D004622:Embryo, Mammalian / Q000187:drug effects*; D005060:Europe; D005121:Extremities / Q000196:embryology*; D007391:International Cooperation; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000145:classification; D011786:Quality Control; D051381:Rats; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D018675:Toxicity Tests / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations