Many preclinical studies are conducted and thousands of research papers are published every year. However, these publications fail to provide clear information on how the study was designed, conducted, and analysed. They lack the standards of scientific rigour and transparency in their reports. As a result, they lose their value in informing future scientific studies, designing drugs and making policy decisions.
In such a scenario, you can be a role model and increase the potential of your preclinical research by designing robust preclinical studies.
You must plan your experiment before starting. So, here are the tips on how to design a powerful experiment and detect biologically important results.
1) Minimize bias
There’s always the potential for bias when assessing the results of your study, especially if a subjective element is involved.
Therefore, perform the experiment in such a way that the researchers are “blind” to the division of the animals to treatment groups and mouse genotypes.
2) Housing and husbandry considerations
If you use mice with different genotypes in your study, generate similar housing conditions for all. This ensures comparable environment and maternal influences on your animal models.
3) Report your methods and results accurately
Check out Animal Research Reporting of In Vivo Experiments (ARRIVE) guidelines to report your animal research completely and accurately.
Take these fundamental steps to develop robust preclinical studies that use mouse models of human diseases and make a difference in the world of clinical research.