{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.02252997106242249, 'fraction_numerical': 0.007441091360066143, 'mean_word_length': 5.251937984496124, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 1, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 2, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
The art and science of introducing animals to the research environment.

Every animal care and use program, regardless of the type of research supported or the species utilized, must implement processes to prepare animals for the laboratory environment. In the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (NRC 1996), it is stated that newly received animals should be given a period for physiologic, psychologic, and nutritional stabilization before use. Despite the general consensus of agreement within the laboratory animal science community regarding the necessity of this provision, there is relatively little in the literature to guide the process for developing best practices in this area. The art of common sense and professional judgment are often applied, albeit sometimes not as frequently as should be when data-driven science is lacking. In this age of ever greater sharing of unsupported assertions and thoughts through LISTSERVES and other forms of nonreviewed electronic means, it is imperative for the animal care and use community to use fact-based knowledge whenever and wherever possible to develop institutional best practices and guidelines. Both art and science are involved in the way animals are prepared for the research environment, and much can be learned from colleagues in other animal science endeavors. The principles that govern how we prepare laboratory animal species for the research environment are not all that dissimilar from principles of preparing livestock for housing and use. The interested reader is encouraged to examine the published works of the noted veterinarian Temple Grandin, who has written extensively on how to prepare livestock for handling and use. It has been shown that for cattle, the interplay of genetic factors affecting behavior, as well as previous experience, strongly determines fear responses during handling (Grandin 1997). Dr. Grandin stresses the need for understanding species-specific behaviors, the need for designing appropriate equipment, and perhaps most importantly, the need for training personnel in how animals are best handled (Grandin 1993). She discusses the utility of training animals when appropriate to voluntarily cooperate with veterinary procedures, and the importance of assessing both behavioral and physiological measurements for adverse effects on animals (Grandin 1999). These issues of livestock handling do not differ from those we face in the laboratory animal science arena. The preparation of animals for experimentation involves all facets of the animal care and use community including animal breeders and vendors, those who prepare and transport animals, those involved with institutional animal care and use programs, as well as the research community that utilizes animals and analyzes data from in vivo experiments. All too often the researcher who orders an animal from a catalog thinks that the start of the in vivo study is the start of his or her experimental protocol, rather than also considering how that animal has been prepared for entry into the institutional animal care and use program, facility, and/or experimental setup. Laboratory animal veterinarians may think solely of microbial factors and disease prevention issues when designing methods to prepare animals for the laboratory, without giving thought to experimental endpoints. For instance, in some facilities the preparation period for nonhuman primates may be designed to allow for three negative tuberculosis examinations with the minimum 2-wk period between them, but this time may not be enough to allow animals to acclimate for some commonly assessed physiologic parameters (Hassimoto et al. 2004). The lack of awareness of how animals need to be habituated to novel environments can lead to serious effects on experimental data. It has been shown for instance that acclimation of rats to metabolism cages for 21 days led to a 60-fold reduction in median lethal dose (LD50) responses to a nephrotoxic substance compared with the same study in nonacclimated animals (Damon et al. 1986). This response was shown to be due to the fact that nonacclimated animals were not accustomed to drinking in the novel housing environment and that the dehydration augmented nephrotoxJeffrey I. Everitt, D.V.M., is Director, Comparative Biology & Medicine, GlaxoSmithKline Research & Development, Research Triangle Park, NC. Steven J. Schapiro, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Comparative Medicine at The Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research, Department of Veterinary Sciences, The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX. Address inquiries or reprint requests to Dr. Everitt, GlaxoSmithKline Research & Development, P.O. Box 13398, Five Moore Drive, Research Triangle Park, NC, or email jeffrey.x.everitt@gsk.com.