Pigs to aid research into cystic fibrosis

Published on Thursday 25 September 2008 21:52

SCIENTISTS have created pigs with cystic fibrosis to help in the search for treatments for the devastating inherited disease.

The pigs are the first animals to mimic the symptoms of the condition, which affects more than 8,000 people in the UK.

Scientists expect the pigs to open up new areas of understanding about the disease, and help develop new treatments.

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is triggered by a faulty gene carried by about one in 25 people.

The disorder causes widespread damage to internal organs, especially the lungs and gut, clogging them with mucus.

Although scientists can engineer laboratory mice with the CF gene, the animals are too different from humans to develop the disease in a human-like way.

Professor Randy Prather, from the University of Missouri-Columbia in the US, one of the scientists who produced the pigs, said the animals were much more similar to humans.

"Right now, if you want to do experiments to find treatments or therapies for the lung disease that is fatal for people with CF, you would have to experiment on kids that have CF.

"When the genetic mutation is introduced into mice, they do not display the symptoms of CF.

"That's why these new swine models are so important."

Alan Larsen, director of research at the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, said: "A large animal model of CF will for the first time allow new therapies aimed at curing CF to be developed and tested in a realistic setting."