How much stress do researchers inflict on their study animals?: A case study using a scincid lizard, Eulamprus heatwolei
How much stress do researchers inflict on their study animals?: A case study using a scincid lizard, Eulamprus heatwolei
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DOI：
10.1242/jeb.02112
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发表时间：
2006-03-15
影响因子：
2.8
通讯作者：
Shine, R
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Langkilde, T;Shine, R
对活体脊椎动物的研究受伦理委员会的监管，伦理委员会禁止“过度紧张”的程序。这种判断是基于直觉--在处理与人类遗传距离遥远的动物时，这是一个众所周知的不可靠标准。为了客观地评估研究实践所施加的压力，我们测量了蜥蜴（Eulamprus heatwolei威尔斯和惠灵顿，Scincidae）的血浆皮质酮水平。一些程序（处理和测量，脚趾修剪识别，暴露于捕食者的气味）并没有引起皮质酮水平的显着增加，这表明这些刺激产生的压力相对较小。然而，其他刺激（测试运动速度，植入微芯片，血液采样，不熟悉的围栏，尾巴自切，暴露于异种蜥蜴）更具压力，皮质酮水平在某些治疗中仅短暂增加（尾巴自切<2小时），但在其他治疗中持续更长时间（植入微芯片14天）。总的来说，我们的数据表明，常规实验室程序引起的压力水平并不高于蜥蜴在自然界中经常经历的压力水平;但这种直觉为评估研究引起的压力水平提供了一个糟糕的基础。例如，剪脚趾经常受到批评，有时甚至被禁止;但我们的数据表明，这种方法实际上比出于伦理原因经常推荐的替代技术（微芯片植入）压力更小。剪脚趾也比表面上琐碎的操作压力小，比如把动物关在一个不熟悉的围栏里。更一般地说，我们敦促研究人员寻求客观的信息，他们的活动对研究对象的影响，而不是依赖于主观性和拟人化，使这些评价。
Research on live vertebrates is regulated by ethics committees, who prohibit ` excessively stressful' procedures. That judgment is based on intuition - a notoriously unreliable criterion when dealing with animals phylogenetically distant from humans. To objectively evaluate the stress imposed by research practices, we measured plasma corticosterone levels in lizards ( Eulamprus heatwolei Wells & Wellington, Scincidae). Some procedures ( handling and measuring, toe- clipping for identification, exposure to predator scent) did not induce significant increases in corticosterone levels, suggesting that these stimuli generated relatively little stress. However, other stimuli ( testing locomotor speed, microchip implantation, blood sampling, an unfamiliar enclosure, tail autotomy, exposure to a heterospecific lizard) were more stressful, with corticosterone levels increasing only transiently in some treatments (< 2h for tail autotomy), but persisting much longer in others ( 14 days for microchip implantation). Overall, our data suggest that the levels of stress induced by routine laboratory procedures are no greater than those often experienced by lizards in nature; but that intuition provides a poor basis for evaluating the levels of stress induced by research. For example, toe- clipping is often criticized and sometimes banned; but our data suggest that this method is actually less stressful than the technique frequently recommended to replace it on ethical grounds ( microchip implantation). Toe- clipping also was less stressful than superficially trivial manipulations such as housing the animal in an unfamiliar enclosure. More generally, we urge researchers to seek objective information on the effects of their activities on research subjects, rather than relying upon subjectivity and anthropomorphism in making these evaluations.