Lab Anim Res.  2017 Jun;33(2):171-178. 10.5625/lar.2017.33.2.171.

Annual tendency of research papers used ICR mice as experimental animals in biomedical research fields

• Kim JE
• Nam JH
• Cho JY
• Kim KS
• Hwang DY

• KMID: 2407432
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.5625/lar.2017.33.2.171

Abstract

Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) mice have been widely used in various research fields including toxicology, oncology, pharmacology, and pharmaceutical product safety testing for decades. However, annual tendency of research papers involving ICR mice in various biomedical fields has not been previously analyzed. In this study, we examined the numbers of papers that used ICR mice as experimental animals in the social science, natural science, engineering, medicine-pharmacy, marine agriculture-fishery, and art-kinesiology fields by analyzing big data. Numbers of ICR mouse-used papers gradually increased from 1961 to 2014, but small decreases were observed in 2015 and 2016. The largest number of ICR-used papers were published in the medicine-pharmacy field, followed by natural science and art-kinesiology fields. There were no ICR mouse-used papers in other fields. Furthermore, ICR mice have been widely employed in cell biology studies within the natural science field as well as in biochemistry and pathology in the medicine-pharmacy field. Few ICR mouse-used papers were published in exercise biochemistry and exercise nutrition in the art-kinesiology field. Regardless in most fields, the total numbers of published papers involving ICR mice were higher in 2014 than in other years, although the numbers in some fields including dentistry, veterinary science, and dermatology were high in 2016. Taken together, the present study shows that various ICR stocks, including Korl:ICR mice, are widely employed as experimental animals in various biomedical research fields.

Keyword

ICR mice; Korl:ICR mouse; trend; biomedical field; published papers

MeSH Terms

Animals
Animals*
Biochemistry
Dentistry
Dermatology
Mice
Mice, Inbred ICR*
Natural Science Disciplines
Pathology
Pharmacology
Social Sciences
Toxicology

Figure

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  Figure 1 Pedigree of commercially available outbred stocks [13]. Most currently available outbred stocks originated from a single Swiss colony of 200 mice derived from 2 male and 7 female mice. The stocks include NMRI, CFW, MF1, CD1, ICR, NIHS, ND4, and SW.

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  Figure 2 Tendency in the annual number of published papers that included ICR mice as experimental animals. (A) Annual tendency of total published papers involving ICR mice. These numbers were obtained by analyzing big data from 1961 to 2016. (B) Number of paper used ICR mice in each research field. The number of papers published in 2014 classified into each research field based on the classification catalog of the National Research Foundation of Korea. Abbreviations; GT, Genetics; CB, Cell biology; MB, Molecular biology; MI, Microbiology; NS, Nutritional studies; PS, Physiology; BC, Biochemistry; PC, Psychiatry; AT, Anesthesiology; NE, Neurology; PT, Pathology; IM, Immunology; PM, Pharmacology; RM, Rehabilitation medicine; DT, Dentistry; VS, Veterinary science; DM, Dermatology; EB, Exercise biochemistry; EN, Exercise nutrition.

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  Figure 3 Annual tendency in numbers of published papers involving ICR mice in three different fields. Total papers per year were reanalyzed into natural science, medicine-pharmacy, and art-kinesiology fields based on the classified catalog of the National Research Foundation of Korea.

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  Figure 4 Current (2013-2016) tendency in the annual number of published papers involving ICR mice in the natural sciences including genetics, cell biology, molecular biology, microbiology, and nutritional studies.

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  Figure 5 Current (2013-2016) tendency in the annual number of published papers involving ICR mice in the medicine-pharmacy field including physiology, biochemistry, psychiatry, anesthesiology, neurology, pathology, immunology, pharmacology, rehabilitation medicine, dentistry, veterinary science, and dermatology.

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  Figure 6 Current (2013-2016) tendency in the annual number of published papers involving ICR mice in art-kinesiology research including exercise biochemistry and exercise nutrition.

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