What are vaccines and how do they work? What is the role of animals in developing them? Are we morally required to get ourselves (or be) vaccinated? This lesson will help pupils address all these questions, developing their knowledge and understanding of a crucial aspect of health and biological education.
The development process for new medicines can take 15 years and this lesson will help pupils understand why. They understand that new medicines require many stages of testing and trialling, including the use of animals for scientific and legal reasons, and will consider their thoughts and feelings about the ethics of animal research in that context.
These resources will help your pupils understand the Thalidomide tragedy, how it affected its victims, and what could have been done to prevent it. They will learn about the drug development process and the role of animal research within it and consider the ethical implications of science in society.
A film giving a short history of the pacemaker. More information is available here: http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/news/communications-media/top-ten-medical-inventions-pacemakers/
Tens of thousands of people have their lives improved with a heart pacemaker. Since the first pacemakers were implanted more than fifty years ago designs have improved so that pacemakers can adjust their pacing rate automatically and battery life gives years between operations for battery replacement. Now there is the prospect of pill-sized pacemakers powered by external wi-fi signals and heart-repair with engineered heart cells, removing the need for the current bulky technology. All these improvements require animal testing.
A very short history of pacemakers
This is a very short history of pacemakers finishing with the bioengineering that could replace them. Early research on dogs showed the heart could be regulated with external electrical stimulation. Many years later the invention of the transistor and the shrinking of other components led to a portable pacemaker and later a pacemaker that could be placed within the body. These were and are tested on animals such as the guinea-pig and pig. The next step in pacemaker technology may be a pill-sized ‘wifi’ pacemaker inserted into the heart that is powered by an external energy source. Eventually pacemakers may be replaced by biological heart repair, a technology currently being studied in zebrafish.
Animation that introduces the immune system and how it is triggered by vaccines. Covers T and B cells, virus, antigen, antibody. Mentions the role of mice, ferrets and chicken eggs in vaccine research.
This lesson will guide pupils through the controversial topic of animal research, why and how it is used, what the benefits are, its weaknesses and possible alternatives. It is an excellent subject for considering the ethical and social implications of science and for focusing on the complexity of the drug development process.
The discovery of new medicines is a complex and sometimes baffling process. This slide show will help pupils understand how one landmark drug of recent years - Herceptin - was developed for the treatment of breast cancer.
The tutorial explains how animals played a crucial part in the discovery of Herceptin and monoclonal antibodies and provides an excellent case study for debating the ethical dilemma of using live animals for medical research.
What is genetic engineering? Why is it used in animal research? This fun video tutorial shows how genetic modification is helping to tackle the problem of bacterial infection based on current research at the University of Auckland.
This article describes the discovery of X-chromosome by Professor Mary Lyon who died on Christmas day, 2014. It shows how X-chromosome inactivation leads to tortoiseshell cats and usually protects women from the full effects of haemophilia.
KS4/5: Use with students learning about monoclonal antibodies and/or treatments for cancer
Film version available here: http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/resources/video-library/herceptin-the-first-monoclonal-antibody-treatment-for-cancer/
Herceptin video script
Slide 1 of 11
Worldwide, 1.6 million new cases of breast cancer are diagnosed each year, with over half a million deaths.
(http://globocan.iarc.fr/Pages/fact_sheets_cancer.aspx)
40 years ago in the UK, the five year survival rate following diagnosis was 50%. Today that figure is 80% thanks to advances in treatment and screening.
One of these advances is Herceptin, a breast cancer drug that reduces the chance of the cancer returning by over a third.
Video of zebrafish in the wild and in the laboratory. Although zebrafish have been used in research for sixty years we can still learn about their preferences. Watching zebrafish in the wild and studying their ecology can help scientists do this.
References:
Video: Wild zebrafish in India: https://vimeo.com/200660695
Stevens CH et al. (2021). Enrichment for laboratory zebrafish—a review of the evidence and the challenges. Animals 11(3): 698. doi: 10.3390/ani11030698
Sundin, Morgan, Finnøen, Dey, Sarkar, Jutfelt. 2019. On the observation of wild zebrafish in India. Zebrafish Journal
Where the wild zebrafish are: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41684-020-00665-z
Zebrafish welfare: https://nc3rs.org.uk/3rs-resources/zebrafish-welfare
An internet quiz by Understanding Animal Research of over 4,000 people has revealed that only 38% of respondents are aware that it is illegal to test cosmetics or their ingredients on animals in the UK. The UK ended this practice in 1998 and a 2013 EU-wide ban means that it illegal for any cosmetic product to be sold in any EU country if either the product or its ingredients are tested on animals
This film shows people on the street being asked about animals and cosmetics.
http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/news/communications-media/british-public-misled-over-cosmetic-tests/
Respondents were asked to select from a list which shops they believed used animals to test the cosmetic products they sold in the UK. Boots, Tesco and Sainsbury’s were all picked by over 40% of people; The Body Shop was selected by 30% and Lush by 14%.
Understanding Animal Research has written to all major supermarkets and cosmetic retailers, urging them to put additional information in their stores to help inform the public.
It was not just cosmetic testing which stumped members of the public. When asked to identify which of a range of medicines used animals in their development, only 43% correctly recognised that animals were key to the development of all of them, including: vaccines (such as polio, meningitis and HPV), antibiotics, anaesthetics and asthma inhalers.
Wendy Jarrett, CEO of Understanding Animal Research, said:
“The proliferation of ‘Not tested on animals’ or ‘Cruelty-Free’ logos has led many to believe that other cosmetic products sold on the UK market are tested on animals – something which has not been the case for 18 years. While animals continue to play a small but key role in medical developments, the UK has successfully eliminated such testing for cosmetics and, more recently, household products.”
For more information, check out our overview on UK and EU law. EU Regulation 1223/2009, banned both the testing of cosmetics or their ingredients on animals, and the import and sale of such products from abroad. However, most ingredients will have been tested at some point in the past. While the EU, and many other countries, have banned tests on cosmetics or their ingredients, some countries still require cosmetics to undergo animal tests for regulatory purposes. The UK Government is working with regulators in other countries to support them in moving away from cosmetic tests on animals.
PDF of an article explaining the development of RNA vaccines to the point where they are now being used against COVID-19. Suitable for 13+, eg:
What is an RNA vaccine?
Unlike previous vaccines, they don’t contain whole microbes or even fragments. They are made of a genetic sequence, a messenger RNA (mRNA), with the information to produce a protein, in this case, of the coronavirus.
Original link here: https://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/news/research-medical-benefits/rna-vaccines-a-new-tool-against-covid-19/
www.labanimaltour.org is a ‘street view’ 360° online tour of four research facilities that use animals:
• MRC Harwell Institute
• The Pirbright Institute
• University of Bristol
• University of Oxford
The tours contain 56 scenes containing 35 video clips of technicians and scientists. This short teachers guide maps the resources against KS3 - KS5.
So what can you see? There is surgery on a pig to test artificial blood vessels; there are cows being used to make new vaccines against foot-and-mouth disease; mice used in genetic research being transferred to clean cages and monkeys taking tests on computers.
Inside each tour there around ten short videos that include interviews with animal technologists who look after the animals and scientists who use animals in their research. We have also added information points and some labels to the 360 images.
These tours give substance to the ‘working scientifically’ component of the science curriculum and provide some examples that can support work from Key Stage 3 through A-level to undergraduate courses in the biological sciences.
We anticipate that you will ask your students to view particular parts of the tour to answer questions that you set them. We would be delighted to hear how the tours are used and received to guide our future work, and so we can share your ideas with other teachers.
If you have any comments or questions please email me, Richard, at rscrase@uar.org.uk
Dr Sanja Dogramadzi describes research into improving robot-assisted surgery on humans by giving the surgeons operating the robots a ‘sense of touch’ through the robots ‘haptic’ sensors.
This research will require the use of animals before it is ready to be used in people. See more about animal research in Bristol using our 360 online tour here: http://www.labanimaltour.org/bristol
See more films about the use of animals in medical and scientific research here: http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/resources/video-library/
These clips can be used for careers teaching as well as well as Biology.
In this film we see how spiders and scorpions are cared for so they can be ‘milked’ for their venom which is then used in medical research. Large spiders can live for over 20 years so good animal husbandry is essential.
The film covers points such as housing, humidity, and diet.
The animal were filmed at Venomtech, a specialist venom supplier (https://venomtech.co.uk). Find out more about venom derived drugs here: http://www.animalresearch.info/en/drug-development/venom-derived-drugs/
Mice, rabbits, frogs and sheep have all had a role in pregnancy testing. History of science article with info-graphic. Use it in role of women in science and history or as a background information sheet. There is also a video here: https://youtu.be/4tGkiYnD__w
A set of 15 cards listing ten serious and surprising facts about research animals. Each card is backed up by a fully referenced page on www.UnderstandingAnimalResearch.org.uk/animals/10-facts/
Secondary and FE
At the MRC Harwell Institute mice can be genetically modified. One method is to inject RNA into the early stage embryo. Here we see the process through the microscope while the technician explains what she is doing. You can see a 360 online tour where this was filmed here: http://labanimaltour.org/
