Presentation
The use of living organisms is central to the CBI’s activities. The CBI hosts several cutting-edge animal platforms (Mouse facility, Aquatic facility hosting zebrafish, Xenopus and Hemigrammus, Bee facility, Drosophila facility) as well as numerous organisms hosted in the research groups: a wide variety of microbes (yeasts, slime mold, archaea and bacteria, including human pathogens); worms and insects. The CBI is a unique place in France that offers expertise, infrastructure and access to such a large range of model organisms.
The CBI mouse zootechnics platform is part of the ANEXPLO platform in Toulouse,which comprises 7 other sites in the Toulouse region with complementary technical skills in the creation and experimentation of animal models. It offers a range of services for housing wild-type and genetically modified mice.
The platform is open to academic and private laboratories. All projects are reviewed by the local ethics committee and the French Ministry of Research to ensure compliance with ethical principles (C2EA ethics committee No. 1 and animal welfare structure).
The platform offers housing services for wild-type and genetically modified mice. It currently has a housing capacity of 1,500 cages divided into several zones with different health statuses (SOPF, EOPS and quarantine).
Production, breeding and housing of mice:
– The platform’s staff are responsible for changing the litter, food and water, enriching the animals and monitoring their welfare, as well as the breeding plan
– Line management is monitored using Anibio software, which can be consulted remotely by users
– Animal health and welfare are monitored four times a year by means of veterinary inspections and analyses in accordance with FELASA guidelines
Equipment:
EOPS/SPF area (specific pathogen free section)
– 100 m² / 980 individually ventilated cages
– 5 housing buildings with specific equipment for breeding management
– 1 fully equipped laboratory for surgery and experimental animal procedures
– 1 quarantine section
SOPF area (section free of specific and opportunistic pathogens)
– 47.2 m² / 480 individually ventilated cages
– 2 housing and breeding facilities
– Semi-automated laundry for cleaning and decontaminating cages
The CBI aquatic zootechnics platform is part of the ANEXPLO platform in Toulous.
The zebrafish (Danio rerio) is a genetic and pharmacological model of choice. It also has amazing imaging properties and a diurnal lifestyle. For all these reasons, it has become a widely used vertebrate genetic model in research areas such as development, physiology and chronobiology. With the development of techniques using Crisp-R, it has become possible to generate patient-specific alleles that constitute important models for human genetic studies. In addition, several systems have been developed in zebrafish to improve transgenesis (I-SceI, Tol2), one of which is associated with the Gateway cloning system (Tol2Kit, utah.edu). The platform is open to academic and private users and is dedicated to housing transgenic and mutant fish. It is unique in the local landscape as it is the only animal facility of this type on the Paul Sabatier campus. The platform is also used for teaching purposes at Toulouse University, providing embryos for students at L1 to M1 levels, and as a research platform for Master and doctoral studies.
Equipment:
– 1100 aquariums (X2 in 2027) with a capacity of around 32,000 fish
– Centralized water production unit
– Feeding robot
– Quarantine area
– Washing machine
– Injection room (3 injectors)
Imports are subject to a quarantine procedure. Regular veterinary monitoring and health inspections, ethical assessment of projects by the ethics committee and the local SBEA (animal welfare organization).
The Xenopus (Xenopus laevis) facility is dedicated to the housing of wild type Xenopus adults and the production of embryos for research and teaching (Practical for 600 L2 students).
The facility is currently used by the Cell Dynamics team (PI: Theveneau) that studies cell migration and epithelial-mesenchymal transition. Xenopus is a vertebrate tetrapod whose genome is highly conserved compared to human. Xenopus females are fertile for over 10 years and produce 500 eggs per laying. Eggs/embryos are large (1-2mm in diameter), easily accessible for micromanipulation, dissection and targeted injections. Therefore, Xenopus allows high-throughput in vivo gain and loss-of-function experiments, provides large amount of material for molecular biology and biochemistry. As such, Xenopus is a great alternative to other vertebrate models.
Equipment:
– Three racks of 9 tanks connected to a main filtration unit and a stand-alone rack of 9 tank with its own filtration unit that altogether can host around 150 Xenopus. The facility currently runs with circa 70 females and 20 males.
– A micro-injection room with 2 injectors (capacity of 3 possible)
The Xenopus facility has transitioned from a home-made system in the previous (4R3) building to a state-of-the art facility. Techniques used on Xenopus at the CBI include: in vivo knockdown assays using CRISPR-Cas13, CRISPR-Cas9, Morpholino and dominant-negative, protein purification and western blots, primary cultures, in vivo grafts, in vivo time-lapse imaging, ex vivo assays for cell migration, protein turnover.
The fish Hemigrammus rhodostomus (Rummy-nose tetra) has a very pronounced schooling behavior, which makes it particularly interesting for studying collective behavior.
The aim of current scientific projects is to identify the interactions that control the coordination of movements and the transmission of information in groups of fish and to analyze the avoidance strategies and collective responses of these groups to a disturbance that simulates a predator attack. These projects use a closed-loop virtual reality system developed at CBI-CRCA in collaboration with IRIT and LPT to measure and analyze in real time interactions between fish within a shoal and their effects on individual and collective behavior.
The Hemigrammus animal house includes a TECHNIPLAST ZEBTEC ACTIVE BLUE system with a maximum capacity of 2,000 animals
The CBI drosophila platform (Drosophila melanogaster) provides facilities for the daily work of all teams using Drosophila as a working model at CBI and produces drosophila food for all academic groups working with Drosophila in Toulouse (University practical courses, Restore, EDB). In addition to standard food, it can provide optimized food for specific needs. It is equipped with two microinjection stations for generating transgenic drosophila transgenic lines for the CBI groups (e.g. using attP/attB systems and CRISP-R/Cas9 technology). It also maintains, a stock collection of mutants which includes up to 2000 fly lines.
Members of the facility also participate in setting up courses and training programs at different levels (high school, Master, PhD) and supervise students for Drosophila transgenesis and fly food preparation.
The unit has an experimental apiary, a unique experimental station which has been registered as Regional Platform by the CNRS Regional Delegation.
The apiary ensures the control of genetic background of domesticated breed of honey bees, handling and survey of pathologies, rational managements of populations, hive-product extraction. In addition, it offers laboratory rooms for behavioral experiments open to researchers willing to develop projects on the behavior of honey bees, and possibly other insects. Given the large surface surrounding the facilities, experiments in semi-natural conditions are also possible. Besides scientific activities, the apiary can also serve as a socio-economical and educational support platform.
The CBI has rearing facilities for various species of temperate and tropical arthropods, which exhibit significant biological differences, including ants, crickets, and spiders. These facilities are primarily utilized by the IVEP and CAB teams. Additionally, the facilities are employed to support educational initiatives, leveraging the recognized educational advantages of rearing ants in classrooms.
The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been developed has a model organism for developmental biology and neurobiology. It is cheap, easy to handle and transparent to visible light. It is used by CBI teams to study behavior, immunity and microbiota.
The slime mold Physarum polycephalum (aka the blob) is a well-established model organism in cell biology, biophysics, and behavioral science. It is easy to culture, and exhibits remarkable macroscopic behaviors despite being unicellular. Physarum is used by CBI teams to investigate decision-making, learning and responses to environmental stressors.
Yeasts are the historical model organisms used for Eukaryote molecular genetics. At CBI, Saccharomyces cerevisiae (budding yeast) and Schizosaccharomyces pombe (fission yeast) are used for genetics and cell biology studies.
Archaea are micro-organisms that form the third domain of life. They are phylogenetically distinct from procaryotes but do not bear a nucleus, making them also distinct from eucaryotes. They are used to understand the limits of life and key cellular adaptation processes owing to their amazing properties. At the CBI, Hyperthermophile Thermococcales models are used for molecular biology, biochemistry and genetics studies at high temperature.
Bacteria are the most numerous and diverse of living organisms. They are the basis of molecular genetics and biotechnologies. They are also a major health concern, not least because of their ability to acquire drug resistance. Teams at the CBI study basic mechanisms in various bacteria: Enterobacteriaceae; Streptococci; Mycoplasma; Mycobacteria; Staphylococci, etc. The current trend is to study bacterial communities and the interaction of bacteria with eukaryotes (i.e. microbiota; infection models), as well as natural isolates collected as pathogens and environmental collections.
