title: Structural and functional concepts in current mouse phenotyping and archiving facilities.
abstract: Collecting and analyzing available information on the building plans, concepts, and workflow from existing animal facilities is an essential prerequisite for most centers that are planning and designing the construction of a new animal experimental research unit. Here, we have collected and analyzed such information in the context of the European project Infrafrontier, which aims to develop a common European infrastructure for high-throughput systemic phenotyping, archiving, and dissemination of mouse models. A team of experts visited 9 research facilities and 3 commercial breeders in Europe, Canada, the United States, and Singapore. During the visits, detailed data of each facility were collected and subsequently represented in standardized floor plans and descriptive tables. These data showed that because the local needs of scientists and their projects, property issues, and national and regional laws require very specific solutions, a common strategy for the construction of such facilities does not exist. However, several basic concepts were apparent that can be described by standardized floor plans showing the principle functional units and their interconnection. Here, we provide detailed information of how individual facilities addressed their specific needs by using different concepts of connecting the principle units. Our analysis likely will be valuable to research centers that are planning to design new mouse phenotyping and archiving facilities.
authors.affiliation: Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, Braunschweig, Germany.
authors.forename: Heike
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Kollmus
authors.forename: Rainer
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Post
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Brielmeier
authors.forename: Julia
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fernández
authors.forename: Helmut
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Fuchs
authors.forename: Colin
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: McKerlie
authors.forename: Lluis
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Montoliu
authors.forename: Pedro J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Otaegui
authors.forename: Manuel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rebelo
authors.forename: Hermann
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Riedesel
authors.forename: Jesús
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ruberte
authors.forename: Radislav
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sedlacek
authors.forename: Martin Hrabě
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: de Angelis
authors.forename: Klaus
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Schughart
mesh_terms: D032761:Animal Experimentation; D000818:Animals; D018070:Biological Specimen Banks; D001947:Breeding; D005160:Facility Design and Construction; D006799:Housing, Animal; D007753:Laboratories; D051379:Mice / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics; D008817:Mice, Mutant Strains; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D023421:Models, Animal; D010641:Phenotype