The numbers of genetically engineered mouse models have grown significantly in recent years.  With the creation of various repositories and consortiums, the ability to purchase mouse models has grown accordingly.

At this time there is no one single comprehensive repository for all genetically modified mice.  There are various databases for researchers to search for transgenic mouse models that are for sale from commercial suppliers or mouse repositories.  Listed below are a few useful websites and a description of what each offer.

**If you are interested in bringing in mouse lines that will not pass the health requirements of the HSARC, please do contact us.  We do have the ability to rederive mouse lines in house using embryos or sperm.  Contact us at transgen@ucalgary.ca.

International Mouse Strain Resource (IMSR)

The IMSR is a searchable online database of mouse strains, stocks, and mutant ES cell lines available worldwide, including inbred, mutant, and genetically engineered strains. The goal of the IMSR is to assist the international scientific community in locating and obtaining mouse resources for research. Note that the data content found in the IMSR is as supplied by strain repository holders.

For each strain or cell line listed in the IMSR, users can obtain information about:

• Where that resource is available (Repository Site)
• What state(s) the resource is available as (e.g. live, cryopreserved embryo or germplasm, ES cells)
• Links to descriptive information about a strain or ES cell line
• Links to mutant alleles carried by a strain or ES cell line
• Links for ordering a strain or ES cell line from a Repository
• Links for contacting the Repository to send a query

The IMSR began with an initial collaboration between the Mouse Genome Informatics (MGI) group at The Jackson Laboratory and the Medical Research Council Mammalian Genetics Unit at Harwell. Additional institutions and collaborators are now contributing mouse resource information to the IMSR catalog (see below).

GemPharmatech

GemPharmatech is a global biotech company dedicated to providing a one-stop-shop solution for in vivo biomedical research using genetically engineered mouse models.

GemPharmatech is proud to launch the KnockOut All Project (KOAP) which aims to build a resource library of conditional knockout and knockout models for more than 22,000 of all protein coding genes in the mouse genome. This effort draws upon GemPharmatech’s strong R & D capability, which allows us to produce over 6,000 new mutant strains annually. With the phase I launch of KOAP, we have completed constructing more than 16,000 mouse lines using CRISPR/Cas9 technology. We are now launching phase II, which presents a wonderful opportunity to match your research needs with our ever-growing resources.

Mouse Genome Informatics (MGI in conjunction with Jackson Laboratory)

http://www.informatics.jax.org/

From the MGI website:  MGI is the international database resource for the laboratory mouse, providing integrated genetic, genomic, and biological data to facilitate the study of human health and disease. The projects contributing to this resource are:

Mouse Genome Database (MGD) Project

MGD includes data on gene characterization, nomenclature, mapping, gene homologies among mammals, sequence links, phenotypes, allelic variants and mutants, and strain data. See About MGD.

Gene Expression Database (GXD) Project

GXD integrates different types of gene expression information from the mouse and provides a searchable index of published experiments on endogenous gene expression during development. See Gene Expression Database (GXD) and About the Gene Expression Database (GXD).

Mouse Tumor Biology (MTB) Database Project

MTB integrates data on the frequency, incidence, genetics, and pathology of neoplastic disorders, emphasizing data on tumors that develop characteristically in different genetically defined strains of mice. See Welcome to the Mouse Tumor Biology (MTB) Database and Mouse Tumor Biology Database User Help Reference.

Gene Ontology (GO) Project at MGI

The Mouse Genome Informatics group is a founding member of the Gene Ontology Consortium (www.geneontology.org). MGI fully incorporates the GO in the database and provides a GO browser. See Functional Annotation using the Gene Ontology (GO) and The Gene Ontology (GO) Project.

MouseCyc Project at MGI

The MouseCyc database focuses on Mus musculus metabolism and includes cell level processes such as biosynthesis, degradation, energy production, and detoxification. It is part of the BioCyc (http://www.biocyc.org/) collection of pathway databases created at SRI International. Pathway information in MouseCyc is integrated with MGI data. See Mouse Cyc - Biochemical Pathways.

Mouse Repository UC Davis

https://www.komp.org/

CRISPR Technology Website links to CNB

CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) sequences and Cas (CRISPR-associated) proteins are the two elements of an ancient defence prokaryotic adaptive restriction system conserved in bacterial genomes. While CRISPRs represent the memory of the system, a repository of short, directly repeating nucleotide sequences flanked by short unique unique DNA fragments, acquired from previous infections, Cas proteins are the actual effectors, that are able to process the CRISPR sequences into small RNAs, and to cleave those infectious DNA molecules that perfectly match those CRISPR-derived RNAs. To translate a complex prokaryotic system into a simple genome editing tool, the crRNA (CRISPR RNA) and the tracrRNA (trans-activating crRNA) have been fused in a synthetic small guide RNA (sgRNA), composed by a hairpin RNA structure, resembling the tracrRNA, linked to a 20 bp sequence homologous to the target DNA. Out of all the CRISPR-associated proteins, Cas9 is the final effector, capable of complexing and cleaving both strands of a DNA molecule upon detecting a typical Watson&Crick homologous base pair match with the sgRNA. Therefore the CRISPR-Cas system is often referred as CRISPR/Cas9. Genome engineering by these RNA-programmable Cas9 nucleases have broad applications in biology, biomedicine and biotechnology. The microbiologist Emmanuelle Charpentier and the structural biologist Jennifer Doudna, along with the rest of their colleagues co-authoring the first seminal publications on this subject, are the ones to be credited for having investigated and brought this amazing prokaryotic tool to the attention and for the benefit of the eukaryotic world.

 CRISPR information website with links http://www.cnb.csic.es/~montoliu/CRISPR/

Introduction to Engineered Nucleases