Animal research: pressure and pushback

Another attempt to ban researchers’ animal use fails but some want more backing for alternatives

In the 1990s, Lluis Montoliu created dozens of genetically modified mice when working as an early career researcher in molecular genetics. This wasn’t unusual. Small rodents were, and still are, often used as a model for studying the function of genes.

“At the time, there [were] no other alternative methods to try to understand how genes work,” Montoliu, now a biotechnology researcher at the Spanish National Research Council in Madrid, tells Research Europe.