Abstract

DEVELOPMENT OF TRANSGENIC FISH MODELS FOR RESEARCH

*Dr. Govind Pandey

Abstract

Fish have played significant roles in assessing potential risks associated with exposure to chemical contamination in aquatic environments. Considering the contributions of transgenic rodent models to biomedicine, it has been noted that the development of transgenic fish may have significant role of fish in a variety of biological research. Hence, transgenic fish in experimental studies has been recently introduced as new model and method for research. Rapid advances are most evident in the area of in vivo mutagenesis using fish carrying transgenes that serve as recoverable mutational targets. These models highlight many advantages afforded by fish as models and illustrate important issues that apply broadly to transgenic fish in bioscience. Researchers have revealed that fish exhibit frequencies of spontaneous mutations similar to rodents and respond to mutagen exposure consistent with known mutagenic mechanisms. Results have shown the feasibility of in vivo mutation analyses using transgenic fish and have illustrated their potential value as a comparative animal model. Challenges to development and application of transgenic fish relate to the needs for improved efficiencies in transgenic technology and fish husbandry. Thus, it seems that transgenic fish will make significant contributions in biological research.

Keywords: Biological research, mutations, transgenes, transgenic fish models.