Additional Services Offered by Transgenic Core

Embryo Rederivation

Do you need to clean up a particular mouse line from pathogenic contamination? The Transgenic Core uses the following method for embryo rederivation:

• Client coordinates the receipt of at least 2 males ages between 2-5 months, of desired strain into the Rodent Isolation Unit (RIU) with the Animal Care Program Aquisitions Office
• Core aquires wild-type females of the appropriate background strain and schedules procedure
• Core superovulates and RIU personnel mate females with males in RIU
• Core collects embryos, washes them and transfers into the oviducts of pseudopregnant recipient females
• Client receives pregnant recipient females into their animal colony approximately 4 days after procedure
• Client separates mothers, records births, and genotypes offspring

Please contact tg@ad.ucsd.edu for more information.

Ovary Transplants

The Transgenic Core can also perform ovary transplants for Clients as needed. Here is a brief overview:

• Client provides a female mouse ideally less than 8 months old that is infertile or cannot carry pups to term
• Core removes ovaries of donor female, bisects ovaries
• Core ovariectomizes recipient females and transplants donor ovary into 3 females total - 1 Bilateral and 2 Unilateral
• Core transfers recipients immediately back to Client
• Client mates recipients with wild-type males 2 weeks after surgery
• Client genotypes pups to ensure the donor ovary has contributed eggs

Please contact tg@ad.ucsd.edu for more information.

Embryo Cryopreservation

Do you need to store valuable lines of mice for future use? The Transgenic Core uses the following method for embryo cryopreservation:

• Client coordinates the receipt of at least 8 males ages 2-5 months, of desired strain into the Rodent Isolation Unit (RIU) with the Animal Care Program Aquisitions Office
• Core aquires wild-type females of the appropriate background strain and schedules procedure
• Core superovulates and RIU personnel mate females with males in RIU
• Core collects embryos, washes them, then freezes them in vials using DMSO as cryoprotectant
• Core will store frozen embryos a maximum of one week prior to transfering vials to the client for long term storage
• Core thaws 1 vial of frozen embryos when required by investigator (all inclusive in the price of freezing) and cultures them to blastocyst stage
• Core implants blastocysts into oviducts of pseudopregnant recipient female mice
• Client receives pregnant recipient females into their animal colony approximately 4 days after procedure
• Client separates mothers, records births, and genotypes offspring

Please contact cryo@ad.ucsd.edu for more information.