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Letters of Support:
Investigators are encouraged to contact the Center for Biometric Analysis (CBA) during the early stages of project planning, especially for projects being proposed for grant applications. Please contact the CBA Senior Director for a letter of support.
Budget Estimation: Given the custom nature of each investigator’s project, please contact us to discuss service pricing.
Facilities and Other Resources Documentation:
The CBA is a state-of-the-art, ~21,000-ft2 dedicated mouse phenotyping facility located on the JAX campus in Bar Harbor, ME, that has extensive expertise and facilities for sensitive phenotyping of live mice. The three-floor CBA houses facilities for phenotyping in four major domains, and provides dedicated phenotyping expertise in each domain: Metabolic Phenotyping, encompassing multiple areas of metabolism; Neurobehavioral Phenotyping, which is carried out in the Connie Cogswell Rossi Center component of the CBA and encompasses diverse areas of behavior; Physiology and Cardiovascular Phenotyping, comprising diverse areas of physiology and cardiovascular biology; and Pre-clinical Imaging, focused on visualization of mouse anatomy, function, and physiology. The top floor, which includes 12 procedure rooms, a surgery suite, and an animal-housing room that can accommodate 550 positive individually vented (PIV) cages, is dedicated to Neurobehavioral Phenotyping. The middle floor, which includes 13 procedure rooms, and an animal-housing room that can accommodate 550 PIV cages, houses Physiology and Cardiovascular Phenotyping and Metabolic Phenotyping. The ground floor, which is dedicated to Pre-clinical Imaging, includes two procedure rooms, an MRI suite, and an animal-housing room that can accommodate 50 PIV cages.
The CBA houses diverse phenotyping equipment for each domain. Neurobehavioral Phenotyping capabilities include assessments of general activity, motor and fine motor function, social behavior, anxiety- and depression-related behaviors, addiction-related behaviors, seizure activity, cognitive functions (learning, memory, and attention), sensorial responses (nociception, tactile, hearing, and visual abilities), aging characteristics (frailty), and home cage activity monitoring including voluntary exercise. Physiology and Cardiovascular Phenotyping capabilities include measurement of electroretinography and visual evoked potential; vision behavior via visual acuity; anterior segment, fundus, and optical coherence tomography imaging of the eye; ECG analysis of heart electrical activity; high-throughput, non-invasive measurement of conscious heart rate and blood pressure; telemetry devices enabling continuous or scheduled measurement of blood pressures or biopotentials (electrocardiography or electroencephalography/ electromyography) in up to 16 conscious, freely moving mice simultaneously; physiological assessment of hearing; and sleep/wake monitoring of up to 80 individually housed mice simultaneously. Metabolic Phenotyping capabilities include measurement of whole-body composition of fat and lean tissue mass; whole-body glucose, insulin, mixed meal and pyruvate tolerance; sub-cutaneous temperature; exercise and endurance testing; glucose-stimulated insulin secretion via hyperglycemic clamps; and parameters of energy balance (including energy expenditure, food intake, and activity) via an automated home cage-based phenotyping system. Pre-clinical Imaging capabilities include: microcomputed X-ray tomography, both ex vivo and in vivo platforms, enabling 3-D reconstruction and assessment of body structures and longitudinal studies of individual animals; an MRI scanner enabling non-invasive, non-ionizing radiation, in vivo assessment of anatomy, micro-structure and function, and in vivo longitudinal studies of individual animals, with sensitivity to tissue and molecular parameters of composition and motion; dual-emission X-ray absorptiometry for quantification of body composition and bone densitometry; collection of 2-D high-resolution digital X-ray radiographic images; and ultrasonography for anatomical and functional scanning of mice, including high-resolution analysis of heart function and blood flow.
The CBA is located within the Research Animal Facility, and all rooms in the CBA are constructed in accordance with the requirements of The Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (NIH, 2011). The CBA is a well-integrated component of the JAX Repository, one of the largest mouse repository and rederivation programs in the world, where thousands of different mouse strains and models are easily accessible.
Example of equipment within the Center for Biometric Analysis. Due to evolving equipment needs, this list may change over time.
Center for Biometric Analysis equipment (located in Bar Harbor, ME)
Metabolic Phenotyping
Neurobehavioral Phenotyping
Physiology and Cardiovascular Phenotyping
Acknowledgement & Authorship:
If you have used any of JAX’s Scientific Services please acknowledge the Service(s) used in all manuscripts, publications, grant applications, press releases, and presentations. Example language for the use of the CBA is below:
“We gratefully acknowledge the contribution of [optional: name of person] and the Center for Biometric Analysis at The Jackson Laboratory for their contributions to this study.”