Seminar 2
Deepak Soman
Jinxing Huo
Seunghee Jeong
Birger Marcusson
Shiuli Pujari
Animal Ethics
• Research Project:
– Understanding how inflammation is affected by
different biomaterials (i.e. nano-scaled materials)
– Use a mouse model to study cell to biomaterial
response in vivo
Mouse sacrificed
and tissue excised
Ethical Dilemas
• Animal suffering
– Premature animal death due to the toxicity of the
material
• Research results are not always repeatable,
therefore needing more animals to gain
concise, conclusive results
• Research results not always applicable to
humans
Alternative Solutions
• Developing stronger in vitro tests to minimize
the use of animals
• Using high thoroughput systems
• Computer simulations
• Ex vivo systems
Who gets affected?
• Patients
The patients who gets the treatment have to bear
the good effects and side effects
• Medical field
Doctors and other medical people related will be
affected
• Research group
• Society
• Values
– To make more bio-compatible materials for medical applications
in order to reduce the suffering of patients
– Using computer simulations will reduce the number of animals
sacrificed.
• Interest
– Economic interest is involved in the solutions and will influence
the choice of solution.
• Duties
– The researchers should always keep in mind the safety issue.
Avoid exaggeration or distortion.
– The researchers should make sure the materials being used in a
right application instead of being misused.
• Attitudes
– People’s attitudes are affected by the results
Effects of solution and alternatives
• Solution; animal test with nanomaterials for bone regeneration
• Altenatives; in-vitro test with culturing of biological samples
Strength/possibility
Weakness/Risk
Solution
• Real feasibility test
• Research speed (fast)
• Research impact (high)
• Animal suffer (Ethical issue)
• High cost
Alternative
• Less ethical issue
• Low cost and easy test
• Different with real system
(Not fully feasible)
• Imperfect at this time
• Ethical issue can be changed by the benefits of research to human life
• Ethical issue can be harder when economy is connected.
(For example, commercialization for benetifs)
• Ethical conflict always exists due to different situation and needs.
Optimal Solutions
• The implant should ideally be developed without tests on
animals.
• Strive to simulate interactions of humans with implant
materials as much as possible.
• An optimal implant should ideally be dissolved and replaced
by the patient’s own tissue.
• Delaying the introduction of the implant on the market in case
of known toxicity that could cause patient suffering
• Researchers could sign binding agreements with
manufacturers to follow certain guide lines, if any, not already
covered by the legislation concerning e.g. human and animal
welfare.