On 30 September 2014, the Symposium on Alternatives to Animal Testing took place at the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) in Berlin, hosted by the State Office of Health and Social Affairs Berlin. What could be heard there was encouraging.



From left to right: Prof. Monika Schäfer-Korting, Sabine Toepfer-Kataw, Prof. Horst Spielmann and Prof. Gilbert Schönfelder.
Image: State Office of Health and Social Affairs Berlin (Lageso).


At the very beginning of the symposium, Sabine Toepfer-Kataw, State Secretary at the Senate Department for Justice, announced that Berlin will co-fund the Berlin-Brandenburg Animal Welfare Research Prize from 2015. This is a first step toward implementing the coalition agreement, which stipulates the promotion of replacement methods for animal tests. She continued to say that it is good that one exchange information on possibilities that already exist, as the goal is also to enforce the introduction of existing methods into tertiary education and thus facilitate their application.

Until now, the Berlin-Brandenburg Animal Welfare Research Prize has been funded by the German Association of Research- Based Pharmaceutical Companies (vfa). The prize money totals 15,000 euros. Work on developments in the area of 3R can be submitted, i.e. work that leads to the Replacement of animal tests, the Reduction of the number of animals used or the Refinement of methods, which in turn can lead to a reduction of the number of animals experimented on. Should a purely replacement method be honoured, “Bündnis Tierschutzpolitik”, an alliance of the animal welfare organisations “Tierschutzverein für Berlin and Umgebung Corp. e.V.” and “Bundesverband Tierschutz e.V.”, will contribute a further 5,000 euros. Thus as much as 20,000 euros can be awarded, which is intended to be an incentive for research in this direction, says the alliance spokesperson Brigitte Jenner. Applications for the upcoming prize close 31 March 2015.

A highlight of the symposium was the presentation of a computer database for publishing non-technical project summaries. According to the European Directive 2010/63/EU on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes, as well as the recently amended German Animal Protection Act and the German Ordinance on the Protection of Animals used for Experimental or Other Scientific Purposes, citizens have a right to information on what happens to the animals used for experiments. The EU Member States are therefore required to provide the public with access to information in the form of non-technical project summaries. The summaries are required to be easily understandable and contain information on the objectives of the project, including the predicted harm and benefits, the number and types of animals to be used, and a demonstration of compliance with the requirement of replacement, reduction and refinement. Animal tests can be retrieved from the database’s many data sets using a keyword search. Scientists seeking project authorisation for animal tests must fill in a form stating the non-technical project summary as part of their applications. The approving authority must forward the application to the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) within three months, and the BfR must publish it in the database within twelve months.

Prof. Monika Schäfer-Korting reported on the current status of research into the development of skin disease models. A special method allows the work group at the Institute of Pharmacy at Freie Universität Berlin to grow complete human skin with all its layers; they first turn off genes to generate a disease model, for instance to create skin with atopic dermatitis. The models serve to develop suitable pharmaceuticals, but also play a role in fundamental research.

Dr. Frauke Hoffmann from the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB) has investigated the mating behaviour of the African clawed frog. Endocrine disrupting substances in bodies of water, such as pesticides or environmental pollutants, can interact with the human hormonal system, causing damage and possibly diseases. For this reason, chemicals and pharmaceuticals are investigated with regard to their environmental impact, including their biological impact on fishes and frogs. Whereas fishes are used to investigate sexual endocrine mechanisms, the scientists use amphibians to research the effects on thyroid hormones and metamorphosis. This is done invasively, and the animal is subsequently killed. This is where the new test becomes relevant: Dr. Hoffmann and her team have found out that African clawed frogs perform an altered mating song in water enriched with androgens or oestrogens. This is a reversible process and permits the use of the African clawed frog’s song patterns as a test indicator for different endocrine disruptors.

Dr. Michael Beekes from the Robert Koch Institute presented an in vitro assay that can determine the amount of prions, the infectious agents that cause transmissible spongiform encephalopathies such as Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease or BSE. Medical products can thus be tested for prions. Instead of determining the amount of infectious agents in the brains of living hamsters or mice, the scientists conduct the test on primary cell cultures one thousand times more sensitive than the animal test. However, the in vitro method does use primary cells from the brains of hamsters, making this a reduction and refinement of the determination method as opposed to an actual replacement.

Dr. Claudia Röhl, department head at ZEBET - Centre for the Documentation and Evaluation of alternatives to Animal Experiments at the BfR, provided an overview of the current stage of developments in the area of systemic toxicity. Systemic toxicity is, so to speak, the opposite of local toxicity: Despite the successes achieved in the development of replacement methods for testing cosmetics for skin and eye irritation or damage, which involves testing a limited area of the body, testing for systemic toxicity is much more complicated. About ten per cent of animal tests in the area of toxicology are conducted to investigate effects on reproduction and some fifty-five per cent to investigate acute and chronic poisoning. Various organs can be affected when a test substance enters the body’s circulatory system by ingestion or inhalation and is possibly altered in the process. For instance, it may only become toxic after ingestion, whereas in other cases a toxin is neutralised. The broad area of systemic toxicology also includes reproduction and developmental toxicology, for instance when a substance alters the gametes (i.e. spermatozoa and ova) and harmful alterations are passed on to the offspring. Despite the efforts of the past years, there are still not enough replacement methods for animal tests, only some for single aspects, so that animal experiments continue to be conducted.

For this reason scientists try to at least reduce the number of animals used, for instance using imaging techniques. One such example is Prof. Thoralf Niendorf from the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin, who reported on the potential of high performance magnetic resonance imaging for investigating the organs of small mammals. The MDC has several MRI scanners, one of which even has a field strength of 8T (T = tesla, the unit used for measuring the magnetic field strength of MRI scanners). The scanner does not generate or use harmful X-rays or other ionising radiation. At present volunteers are being sought for proband tests. Prof. Niendorf also expressed openness toward new collaborative research, for instance in the area of cognition sciences. This could lead to the replacement of experiments on primates.

Prof. Jörg Luy from Freie Universität Berlin addressed a different aspect: Together with colleagues she has developed a platform called AniMatch, which will make it possible to broker the unused organs of animals already killed for research purposes. The aim is to prevent unused tissues or organs being discarded whilst other animals are killed to obtain just such organs.

The presentations were followed by a panel discussion on the question “How can alternative methods be deliberately promoted?”. Within this context the prospective line of approach was recapitulated:
- Funding in the form of animal welfare prizes
- Bringing together participants and improving communication
- Communicating alternative methods to scientists who do not yet work with them, as well as promoting creativity in this area.

The problem that 70 per cent of animals are used in basic research could not be addressed during the symposium. However, Prof. Horst Spielmann, previously head of ZEBET and now State Animal Welfare Commissioner for Berlin, pointed out that one of the most prominent topics of the World Congress this August in Prague was the development of organ-on-a-chip systems. The disease models on microchips could someday replace the genetically modified animals used as disease models in basic research.