Allergy test is good news for mice

By Andy Coghlan IMMUNE cells taken from humans could soon replace animals in tests to identify chemicals that cause skin allergy. Today, allergy testing is done in mice using the “local lymph node assay”. Analysts apply a chemical to the ears of mice, then extract a nearby lymph node. If white blood cells from the node are dividing quickly, it means the chemical is an allergen. “The holy grail is to find a way of doing this without animals,” says Ian Kimber of AstraZeneca’s toxicology lab at Macclesfield,