List of Model Organisms - Mammalian and Non Mammalian Model Organisms

Characteristics of Model Organism                                                            MCQ on Model Organism

Mammalian and Non Mammalian Model Organisms
I. Mammalian Models

Mus musculus (Mouse)



• Classic model vertebrate
  
• The common house is most closely related to humans and it is easily kept and bred in the laboratory. Thousands of different genetic strains are have been developed.
  
• Transgenic and Knockout mice are helpful for the improvement of molecular and genetic studies
  
• Knockout mice: Mice, born as a result of a series of experimental procedures, that are lacking a functional gene that would normally contain.
  
• Most widely used in quantitative genetics studies.
  

Rattus norvegicus (Rat)

Mainly as a toxicology model and also used in many physiological studies related to cardiac, pulmonary circulation, metabolism, neurological control, hypertension and signal transduction.







II. Non-Mammalian Models
                          Escherichia coli (E.coli)


• Rod shaped bacterium
  
• Lives in the digestive tract of humans and other animals.
  
• Many of the basic molecular biology area like DNA replication, transcription, and translation, was originally worked on this prokaryotic organism.

Saccharomyces cerevisiae (Yeast)


• Eukaryote,Unicellular fungus
  
• Widely used in genetics and cytology studies.
  
• It can be grown under aerobic or anaerobic conditions
  
• Exists in the diploid and haploid stages
  
• Many biochemical variants
  
• Small Genome encoding about 6200 proteins
  
• Economically important organism.

Caenorhabditis elegans (C.elegans)


• Microscopic nematode
  
• Excellent model for Physiology and developmental studies
  
• Transparent body wall
  
• Short generation time
  
• Comprises exactly 959 cells ( During the worm's development, 1090 cells are formed of which 131 are removed by apoptosis).
  
• In 2002 Nobel Prize awarded to Brenner, Horvitz and John Sulston for studies of the genetic regulaion of C.elegans development.

Drosophila melanogaster (Fruit fly)

• The organism is well suited for the study of the molecular biology of development and neurological basis of behaviour.
  
• Giant chromosome
  
• The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1933: Thomas Hunt Morgan
  
• The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1995 was awarded jointly to Edward B. Lewis, Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard and Eric F. Wieschaus "for their discoveries concerning the genetic control of early embryonic development".
  

Danio rerio (Zebra fish)

• A freshwater fish
  
• Model used for the development and toxicological studies.
  

Plant Model: Arabidopsis thaliana

• A member of Brassica family (mustard)
  
• Arabidopsis has a small genome (120 million base pairs) relative to other plants
  
• It is easily grown under laboratory conditions
  
• Short generation tome
  
• Large seed production
  
• Systematic studies of Arabidopsis will offer important advantages for basic research in genetics and molecular biology.
  

List of Model Organism Databases