Lectures and seminars Webinar: A mapping review of refinements to laboratory rat housing and husbandry
The aim of these CPD webinars (Continuing professional development) is to follow the legal requirements for maintenance and demonstration of competence in laboratory animal science, and to facilitate the implementations of the 3R’s in routine animal work.
Speaker
Dr Vikki Neville, BBSRC Discovery Fellow & Proleptic Lecturer, Bristol Veterinary School, University of Bristol, UK.
Dr Vikki Neville’s research focuses on better understanding emotions, and hence welfare, in non-human animals, and aims to address three broad questions: (1) how can we measure emotions objectively (2) how can we induce positive emotions and minimise negative emotions and (3) why might emotions exist (i.e. what is their adaptive function)?
To answer these questions, her research takes a multidisciplinary approach and draws on a range of fields including cognitive and computational neuroscience, decision theory, ethology, and psychology. She has studied a range of species in a laboratory setting including starlings, rabbits, and rats.
Register here (by April 25, 16.00 CEST)
Abstract
The implementation of any refinement should have a strong evidence base; it is not economical to expend time and money on refinements that have no benefits to rats, and we need to be certain that any changes we make are not detrimental to welfare.
This is why data synthesis is so important. We conducted a mapping review of studies investigating potential refinements of housing and husbandry to assess what refinements have, and haven’t, been studied, and to assess whether there is evidence to support these refinements in terms of their impact on welfare. This involved qualitative analysis of more than 1000 articles. This talk will outline the results of this analysis, and possible directions for future research into rat housing and husbandry.
Contact
E-mail: las-edu@km.ki.se