ECVAM, TP 580, JRC Environment Institute, 21020 Ispra (Va), Italy
Telephone: +39 332 785 570
Telefax: +39 332 789 963
Email: annett.janusch@ei.jrc.it
Internet: http://ecvam.jrc.it/
or:
FRAME, Russell & Burch House, 96-98 North
Sherwood Street, Nottingham NG1 4EE, England
Telephone: +44 115 958 4740
Telefax: +44 115 950 3570
Email: krys@frame-uk.demon.co.uk
A similar initiative was undertaken simultaneously in the United States. This
resulted in a meeting being held on 23rd October 1996 during the 2nd World
Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences, which was arranged
in Utrecht, The Netherlands, from 20th to 24th October 1996. The purpose of the
meeting was 'to discuss the formation of a multi-national federation to develop a
global network of linked alternatives (Three Rs) databases'. All Congress
participants currently developing an alternatives database in any discipline
(research, testing, education) or who have expertise in database development and
who would like to participate in this worldwide project were invited.
The overview presented below is a combination of the conclusions reached at the
Neubiberg workshop and the resources presented at the Utrecht meeting.
A similar site is being developed by the Johns Hopkins Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing (CAAT) in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Click here to go to their site called Altweb: Alternatives to Animal Testing on the Web.
Please note:
The compilers of these pages have tried to present a complete overview of the
alternatives databases available at the time of writing. The order of citation
is arbitrary and does not represent any attempt to rank the various efforts by
importance. Our aim is to acknowledge all efforts to implement the three R's of Russell &
Burch (Replacement, Reduction and Refinement of animal experiments)
Likewise, any omissions are unintentional.
Please send details of omissions or factual errors, or any other comments you may
have, to:
Professor Adrian Smith, Laboratory Animal Unit, Norwegian School of Veterinary Science, P.O. Box 8146 Dep., 0033 Oslo, Norway.
Telephone: +47 22 96 45 74
Telefax: +47 22 96 45 35
Email: adrian.smith@veths.no
We will update this overview accordingly.
1. databases on replacement alternatives
2. databases on reduction alternatives
3. databases on refinement alternatives
4. database on methodologies including their protocols
5. databases on educational subjects
6. databases on test results
7. databases on QSAR
8. databases on for validation/evaluation purposes
9. databases on experts
10. databases on possible funding
11. databases on regulations/guidelines
12. databases on projects on alternatives
An attempt has been made below to classify the databases according to this list (numbers in brackets after the database name).
Recent Additions |
Akademie für Tierschutz |
AVAR |
AWIC |
APHIS |
Federal Veterinary Office, Bern |
ECVAM |
FDA |
Galileo |
ILAR Guide |
INVITTOX |
The MEIC project |
NCA |
NORINA |
OLAW |
PREX |
Tree of Life |
UC Center of Alternatives |
University of Amsterdam |
VetBase |
WCA abstracts |
The ZEBET database |
The Center provides a variety of information and referral services, including computerized literature searching, expert referral, document delivery, and the acquisition, production, and maintenance of materials pertinent to the topic of animal welfare.
The National Agricultural Library maintains a collection of books, journals, newsletters, proceedings, reports, news articles, slides, films, and video recordings relevant to the various topics addressed by the Center. The Library provides access to these materials via photocopy and interlibrary loans.
AWIC publishes a series of bibliographic reference products, a quarterly newsletter, resource guides, listings, and other publications related to animal welfare. Currently, all publications are supplied free of charge.
AWIC provides online information retrieval services from the National Agricultural Library's AGRICOLA database and selected databases available through DIALOG. (Note that AGRICOLA is available from other sources e.g. in CD form from Silver Platter and from PREX in the Netherlands). Users, with the exception of U.S. Department of Agriculture personnel, may be billed for information support services in excess of one hour of staff time or $25 in online computer costs.
Of special note is Care-CD, an information product recently completed by Mike Kreger of the AWIC staff. This is a CD ROM that contains 169 documents. Most of these are the full text of U.S. Federal documents that are relevant to animal care in research and testing settings. In addition, the CD contains guidelines and statements from various professional organizations, among them the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals produced by ILAR (see below), books, manuals, and training manuals for laboratory personnel; 35 bibliographies, resource guides, newsletter issues, fact sheets from AWIC and 18 zoo animal bibliographies. The disk (stock #001-000-04634-9) can be purchased from:
U.S. Government Printing Office
Superintendent of Documents
PO Box 371954
Pittsburgh, PA 15250-7954
USA
The cost is $35.00 for those in the U.S. International customers need to add 25% additional money for handling. Visa and Mastercard are accepted.
Many of the AWIC documents are also available in full text from the AWIC web site.
For additional information or to contact a staff member, AWIC can be reached in the following ways:
Animal Welfare Information Center
10301 Baltimore Avenue,
Beltsville,
Maryland 20705-2351
USA
Tel: +1-301-504-6212
Fax: +1-301-504-7125
Email: awic@nal.usda.gov
AWIC contact: Jean Larson, Coordinator
email: jlarson@nal.usda.gov
For further information, contact:
PREX,
Utrecht University,
P.O. Box 80166,
NL-3508 TD Utrecht,
The Netherlands
Telephone: +31 30 253 1583
Telefax: +31 30 253 6747
VetBase is produced by Dr. Hans Kuiper and Dr. H.J. Kuiper in Utrecht, The Netherlands. The database is a custom-made MS-Windows application, requiring Windows 3.1 or Windows 95. A free demo of VetBase for IBM Windows is now available. The demo is fully functional for a limited range of drugs (anthelmintics in rodents). Searches for other drug categories return the number of references that the full version contains.
The demo can be downloaded here.
This file (1.2 MB) must be unpacked using the
shareware program pkunzip. Type 'pkunzip vetbase.zip'
The database has been constructed by Dr. Hans
Kuiper (email: j.d.kuiper@accu.uu.nl) of the PREX project.
The abstract database from the 2nd World Congress on
Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences (1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7)
The World Congress was held in Utrecht, The Netherlands, from Monday 20th to
Thursday 24th October 1996. A database containing all the abstracts of
presentations at the Congress is available for IBM Windows machines. The database may be downloaded from our
server. This file (1070 kB) must be unpacked using the shareware program pkunzip. Type 'pkunzip setup.zip'
The ZEBET database (1, 2, 3, 4)
The ZEBET database contains documentation on about 300 alternatives in all fields
of biomedicine and contains a total of about 4000 bibliographical references.
ZEBET is used to provide advice and information to scientists and animal welfare
officers during the process of licensing applications for animal experimentation.
In controversial cases, ZEBET makes an official statement to the regional
authorities which may be used in court cases. ZEBET also handles more general
queries on alternatives from all sectors of society. A trial is in progress to
investigate the feasibility of offering public access to the database through
DIMDI.
Further details from:
Barbara Grune-Wolff, ZEBET, Postfach 33 00 13, D-14195 Berlin, Germany
Telephone: +49 30 84122 271
Telefax: +49 30 84 122 958
Email: zebet@bgvv.de
The following literature reference is also recommended:
Alternatives
to animal testing: information resources via the internet and world wide web,
by P.J. Hakkinen and D.K. Green, published in Toxicology, Vol. 173(1-2), 3-11,
April 2002.
Supporting organizations and companies
The Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing (CAAT), Johns Hopkins
University, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
CAAT is one of the organizations participating in the initiative to create a
global consortium of information on alternatives databases. They have their own
home page.
CAAT is developing a database on antibody production.
The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS)
The Humane Society of the United States is one of
the organizations participating in the initiative to create a global consortium of
information on alternatives databases. The HSUS is the United States' largest
animal protection organization. Their youth education division, the NAHEE
(National Association for Humane and Environmental Education), and the
international organization HSI (Humane Society International) are described in
more detail here.
Laboratory Animals Ltd.
Publisher of Laboratory Animals, the international journal of laboratory
science and welfare. The journal has its own home
page.
This page is provided by the server of the Laboratory Animal Unit, at the Norwegian School of Veterinary Science, Oslo.