Medical research using animals has prolonged the lives of millions of people. Animals such as dogs, cats, guinea pigs, and different strains of rats and mice are used as disease models in medical research to test treatments and surgical procedures. The disease animal models used in medical research have resulted in treatments to combat health disorders that affect my family members. Health disorders such as diabetes and asthma affect some members of my family.
Without the use of animals in medical research, certain medications and treatments would be useless to humans. My youngest brother suffers from severe bronchiole asthma. The animals involved in research for the treatment of asthma include steers and guinea pigs. For example, the adrenal glands of steers produce epinephrine. Epinephrine is a neurotransmitter used in the treatment of asthma. The controlling hormone, ACTH, found in the pituitary gland of steers, is used in medications to relieve the symptoms of asthma.
The guinea pig is another animal used in the research of asthma. An asthma model in guinea pigs has been developed for human asthma research purposes. By treating the guinea pigs with 2,4-toluene diisocyanate (TDI) for about ten weeks, the guinea pigs suffer from labored breathing, a symptom associated with bronchiole asthma in humans, Further research using asthma-induced guinea pigs should aid in the discovery of new treatments and cures to conquer asthma.
The Essay on Discovering Guinea Pigs
I. Project Description and General Information Since the world of Science has evolved, the experiments of scientists and other researchers also improve and get more complicated and may sometimes sound ridiculous. In modern Psychology, specifically in studying certain behaviors, animals have become subjects of some experiments. Now, why do we use Guinea pigs or other animals like rabbits, rats, ...
As a little girl I remember watching my great-grandmother receiving daily insulin injections to control her type 1 diabetes. My grandmother and grandfather also have diabetes. The a few months ago I learned that I run the risk of developing diabetes. My concern about my family’s health as well as the future of my health prompted me to investigate the possibility of a cure for diabetes. As I researched the future of diabetes, I stumbled upon an article about diabetes research being performed on diabetes-prone mice.
When the mice are young they are injected with glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD).
GAD prevents diabetes from developing in the mice by inactivating the immune system cells that attack the pancreas. Researchers have yet to study how GAD induces tolerance against diabetes in humans. The research performed on the mice could be a breakthrough in diabetes research, possibly leading to the prevention of diabetes in future generations of my family.
