RODENT PHENOTYPING CORE & OTHER TECHNICAL CORES

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This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. Primary support for the subproject and the subproject's principal investigator may have been provided by other sources, including other NIH sources. The Total Cost listed for the subproject likely represents the estimated amount of Center infrastructure utilized by the subproject, not direct funding provided by the NCRR grant to the subproject or subproject staff. Over the past 15 years methods have been developed that allow the same range of cardiovascular assessments in mice that can be performed in larger animals. These methods now include blood pressure measurements, (invasive, implanted and non-invasive), echocardiography, electrocardiography, and invasive hemodynamics. Activity measurements include determinations of metabolism, physical activity, and exercise tolerance. As surgical procedures have been miniaturized for the mouse, investigators have added a range of cardiovascular stresses including aortic banding to increase hemodynamic load, various approaches to produce myocardial infarction or ischemia, and infusion of cardiotonic agents by osmotic minipumps. Many of these techniques require highly skilled operators and are not easily mastered by investigators who are usually more knowledgeable about molecular biology or biochemistry than physiology and microsurgery. The Mouse Phenotyping Core is designed to bring these techniques to investigators in the COBRE and wherever in the University community they will advance cardiovascular investigation. Our specific aims derive from this priority. The first aim is to provide comprehensive mouse phenotyping and manipulation to the investigators of the COBRE. The second is to provide these same services to general University researchers to facilitate and encourage application of new biological insights in other fields to problems of cardiovascular disease. The third is to develop new methods and capabilities for assessing and investigating the mouse heart and vasculature. We plan to offer a wide repertoire of basic cardiovascular assessments in the core. We will also modify a novel technology for tissue-specific localization of bioactive agents for use in mice. Our goals are to enhance the efficiency and thus success of COBRE research, and to encourage the application of mouse models to help bring basic research into the realm of physiology and closer to clinical application.