Animal Facility

The animal facility is located on the first floor of the CITA R&D Building, and forms part of a functional unit together with the brucellosis laboratory (brucellosis laboratory). It is a facility for the breeding and maintenance of laboratory animals (mice and rabbits) under the ethical, hygienic, biosafety and legal conditions required by current legislation, with registration for these purposes by the Government of Aragon (ES502970012005).

Mainly, this animal facility supplies experimental animals for virulence studies and protection studies against infection by different virulent strains of Brucella, which are carried out by the P3 brucellosis laboratory.

With a capacity of up to 400 mice, the unit has three different rooms:
 

• Cleaning and disinfection room, used as a storage area (food and bedding) and as an area for cleaning and disinfection of the cages and utensils of the animal facility. It has an autoclave, sink, automatic equipment for washing cages and bottles (thermodisinfector) and drying area, and is equipped with heating and cooling. It communicates with the rooms where the animals are housed.
• Clean room, equipped with shelves and cages with their corresponding drinking and feeding troughs, for the acclimatization and housing of animals free of infection. It has a biological safety cabinet.
• Infection room, equipped with shelves and cages for housing experimentally infected animals. This room is equipped with an air elimination system with microbiological control by means of absolute HEPA filters. It has two biological safety cabins where experimental infections, treatments and necropsies of the animals are performed. It is also equipped with a heating and cooling system to maintain controlled environmental conditions according to the legislation for the protection of experimental animals.

The unit is designed with negative pressure, with sequential pressure drop, and has a ventilation system with absolute HEPA filter, autoclaves and SAS with biological safety cabinets. It has systems for inactivation and disposal of contaminated material and biological waste and waste management by an authorized external company.

Access to the facilities is restricted to authorized personnel.