Articles About Animals in Laboratories

The Laboratory Animal Refinement and Enrichment Forum (LAREF) is an online platform, hosted by AWI, where individuals working with animals in research share ideas and experiences related to improving the welfare of animals under their...

AWI is now accepting applications for 2021 Refinement Grants! Every year, AWI awards up to US$10,000 for research projects aimed at developing or testing creative ideas to improve the welfare of animals in research. Projects...

A technique that is increasingly used worldwide to improve the welfare of rats in research is rat “tickling”—whereby humans make light, brisk, and vigorous movements with their fingertips on a rat’s neck and abdomen to...

Camilla Bengtsson and Marie Eriksson, researchers at the RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, have recently gained some international acclaim for their unique approach to handling and training laboratory mice and rats to reduce stress, anxiety...

An administrative hearing is underway with respect to allegations of Animal Welfare Act (AWA) violations leveled by the US Department of Agriculture against Moulton Chinchilla Ranch (MCR), a supplier of chinchillas for experimentation. (See AWI...

Mounting scientific evidence indicates that environmental enrichment improves the welfare of laboratory mice, but most facilities worldwide still use standard housing (i.e., mostly barren “shoebox” cages). The provision of regular access to enriched environments such...

In the United States, the number of rats and mice used each year for experimentation, testing, and teaching is shrouded in secrecy. The current industry estimate, as reported in Science, is somewhere between 10 and...

A common feature of captive environments is that they deprive individuals of agency—that is, they constrain individuals’ ability to make decisions and exercise control over their environment. Agency is recognized as an important component of...

Researchers at the University of Minnesota have developed a motion-capture system that allows for the markerless 3D tracking of free-moving macaques (Bala et al., 2020). The new technology, called OpenMonkeyStudio, can accurately detect the poses...

In a landmark new study, scientists have shown that cuttlefish are capable of delaying gratification, and that those who choose to delay longer are also more intelligent (Schnell et al., 2021). Cuttlefish are only the...