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Mutant mouse lab facilities welcome visitors today only

Six years after its opening, the National Mouse Mutagenesis Program Core Facility at the Academia Sinica is already among the top mutant mice research facilities in the world.

Mutant mice are important in development of medical technologies. Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes and 30,000 genes, while mice have 20 pairs and near 30,000 genes, Kung Hsiang-chih (孔祥智) was quoted as saying in a story reported by the Chinese- language United Evening News yesterday.

Such similarity makes it possible to find between 80 to 90 percent of common diseases in both humans and mice, said Kung who is also the program director.

Some of the diseases humans and mice share include diabetes, high blood pressure and liver disorders, the report said.

With the aim of developing Taiwan's own mutagenesis industry, former Academia Sinica president Lee Yuan-tseh (李遠哲) asked Kung to create the research facility in 2002.

In the past, mutant mice used in medical research in Taiwan had to be imported from other countries.

In the six years since the research facility's founding however, more than 80 different types of mutant mice have been developed including curly hair, high platelet, trembler and short limb varieties according to the program's Web site.

Each of the mutant types carry a disease. For example, the trembler has Parkinson's disease, and thus is used for research on techniques to prevent and treat the disease.

Kung the team has discovered that more than half of the mutant traits are inheritable, and thus is looking for the particular genes that trigger the diseases.

The research facility will be open to the public from 9:30am to 10:40am, from 11am to 12:10am, from 1pm to 2:10pm and from 2:30pm to 3:40pm today.

For more information, visit mmp.sinica.edu.tw/mmp/english.
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