PU animal house also caters to ‘outside’ experimental needs

Experimental projects from various research scholars and post graduate students from departments including Biochemistry,UIPS,Biophysics,Microbiology,Biotechnology,Zoology and Human Genome are being undertaken at the central house. The university also charge for these animals from both the university departments as well as other institutes. The animal house has two wings-experimental and breeding. Both these are maintained by the university.

“It is difficult to maintain disease free colonies as once the animals get a disease,they are unfit for any kind of experiments. But every efforts are made to ensure that the animals are fit for experiments. For this hygiene,temperature and diets are controlled under strict supervision,” said the veterinary doctor Dr N K Tejpal. He has been associated with the animal house since 1990.

Prior to the stringent animal laws,the animal house used to have monkeys and guinea pigs too. “The type of animals also depends on the experimental requirements. As for projects in Anthropology,monkeys were brought in from Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI),Lucknow. These were discharged once the experiments were completed,” added Dr Tejpal.

As per the experts,with the anatomy of rats and mice similar to human beings,these are the preferred choice by the researchers. Also,as these are economical than other animals,these are maintained in large number.