In vivo models

KI needs to purchase two genetic in vivo models (mouse strains) to cancer research. Crucial mandatory requirements: 1) The company must use radioactive Southern Blotting with 5 ', 3 ', and internal probes, on multiple genomic DNA restriction digests for genetic quality controls. This is the gold standard for quality control in genetic modifications and ensures that during the recombination the neighboring DNA is left unaffected. 2) Animal welfare must conform to approved legislation (Direktive 201 0 _ 63 _ EU and local), health monitoring must be according to FELASA recommendations, the animals produced must match the health standard allowing import into animal facility at Karolinska Institutet (C-Barrier), transport of the produced animals to the Karolinska Institutet must be done by ground transport in approved transport crates. 3) Maintaining the genetic background of the new strains when crossing to our already established lines. Taconic Biosciences Inc (Taconic) is, to KI’s knowledge, the only company that uses 3 probes for the southern blot as validation for ES cell targeting. Taconic is the only company fulfilling the health requirements of the KI animal facility allowing direct import of live mice into the animal house. Also, to maintain the genetic background in crosses between the strains that will be generated in the course of this project and the strains we established earlier, Taconic is the company of choice because the previous strains were established using ES cells from Taconic. Taconic derived these from C57BL6/NTac strain and these are not available to any other company. Using the same ES cells ensures that in future crosses with the new strain and the old strain any change in phenotype can be more reliably attributed to the introduced gene mutation rather than due to changes in the genetic background. KI will sign a contract with Taconic after a standstill period of 10 days after publishing this Voluntary ex ante transparency notice.