News

ABR is now NATA Accredited

February 2018

Australian BioResources would like to announce that the facility is now NATA Accredited under ISO 17025- Research and Development. ABR staff have worked very hard over the last 18 months to bring practices, documentation, reporting, training, and client services up to the standards set by NATA. The process has been highly beneficial for ABR and our goals of minimising errors, optimising service, and maintaining high standards of animal welfare.

Services can now be ordered using StuartWeb

July 2017

ABR is pleased to introduce online ordering for Services via StuartWeb. We will continue to accept the forms below until Tuesday the 15th of August. All orders for services will then be online only. Anyone wishing to order services or track the progress of their service orders will require a StuartWeb Account. Please see Set Up Account or Stuart Web Access to download a StuartWeb access form.

Please find a quick guide to ordering services on StuartWeb below. For additional assistance please contact ABR on (02) 9295 8565 or at orders@abr.org.au

Ordering Services Using StuartWeb

The JAX Rag1 KO mice are now available in Australia

April 2016

Under a propagation agreement with the Jackson Laboratory, the Australian BioResources now supplies the B6.127S7-Rag1<tm1Mom>/JAusb strain (also known as B6.Rag1 or Rag1 KO) to support your research. This strain is fully backcrossed N10 onto a C57BL/6J background.

Did you know?

The Rag1 KO mice were initially developed by Dr Peter Mombaerts in the lab of Dr Susumu Tonegawa at MIT. Mice homozygous for the Rag1<tm1Mom> mutation produce no mature T cells or B cells. Their phenotype can be described as a "non-leaky" immunodeficiency.

Simultaneous Production of KO mice can now reduce costs to ~$3,000 per line

December 2015

The efficiency of CRISPR/Cas9 gene targeting means that multiple genes can be simultaneously inactivated. The MEGA (Mouse Engineering Garvan/ABR) service has now undertaken projects in which founder groups carrying 2, 3 and 4 inactivated genes have been generated from a single microinjection session.

Because microinjection and animal husbandry are our major cost, MEGA is able to offer the following prices on Level 1 projects in which multiple genes will be simultaneously targeted for inactivation.

1 gene = $7,000
2 genes = $8,500 ($4,250 per KO)
3 genes = $10,000 ($3,333 per KO)
4 genes = $11,500 ($2,875 per KO)

As well as being the best way of producing novel KO lines, the economies from simultaneously producing multiple KO lines makes CRISPR/Cas9 a much cheaper and efficient option than importing KO lines into ABR, especially if rederivation is required.

If you would like to take advantage of the multiple targeting option, please get in touch with either Dr David Zahra at d.zahra@garvan.org.au or Professor Rob Brink at r.brink@garvan.org.au.

MEGA has now produced 41 different GM mouse lines, 36 of these over the first 10 months of 2015

November 2015

MEGA Production July 2014-October 2015

GM mice can be produced using CRISPR/Cas9 technology at three different Project Levels:

Level 1: Gene KOs via small frameshift deletions or larger deletions up to 5kb.
Level 2: Small, specific edits using homologous recombination with ssDNA oligonucleotides (e.g. point mutations, peptide tags).
Level 3: Larger alterations using homologous recombination with plasmid constructs (e.g. reporters, fluorescent protein tags, floxing).

The prices for these services are $7,000, $10,000 and $15,000 respectively. The time-frame from order to identification of founder mice is now as low as 10 weeks for Level 1 and Level 2 projects.

Altogether, the CRISPR/Cas9 approaches offered by the MEGA (Mouse Engineering Garvan/ABR) service are 5-10 times cheaper and faster than conventional ES cell approaches, produce mice on a pure C57BL/6 (or FVB/N) background and are free of additional drug selection markers.

MEGA Service gives first client GM mice in less than 4 months

December 2014

The first customers of the MEGA (Mouse Engineering Garvan/ABR) service have taken delivery of their genetically modified founder mice.

Of the 19 mice produced from embryos microinjected with gene-specific CRISPR/Cas9 constructs, 7 founder mice were obtained - a 37% success rate and in less than 4 months from their initial expression of interest. The CRISPR/Cas9 technology can produce constitutive knockouts, single nucleotide mutations or insertions.

For further information on the MEGA Service or to book in your project visit our Genome Editing page.