Over the past century, medical science has developed vaccines for diseases such as polio, smallpox, mumps, and measles as well as discovered new treatments for diabetes, infertility, and heart disease. This includes progress in combating leading causes of death, including HIV, lung disease, and cancer. Additionally, stem cell research has provided new insights that could transform our understanding of human health and biotechnology. None of these breakthroughs would have been possible without animal research. The Foundation for Biomedical Research's website offers details about biomedical advances in both human and animal healthcare.
Our researchers are strong supporters of animal welfare and view their work with animals in biomedical research as a privilege.
It is important to note that less than five percent of animals used in research are primates. Numerous government agencies and organizations ensure that testing is conducted humanely and efficiently. At the California National Primate Research Center (CNPRC), we adhere to the highest standards of animal treatment. Our research on primates is crucial for advancing our understanding of human health and disease, and we have developed models that transform how we conduct experiments and treat life-threatening disorders.
Primates share 98 percent of their genetic makeup with humans. Their body composition, maturation, and reproductive processes are nearly identical to ours, allowing us to safely evaluate and test treatments that can significantly improve human health. Researchers at CNPRC utilize these non-human primate models to enhance our understanding of diseases and immunology, accelerating the discovery process and reducing the time required to make new treatments, cures, and vaccines available.
Our Accomplishments
For more than six decades, countless breakthroughs and contributions to medicine have resulted from the research conducted at the CNPRC. These important research contributions include:
- Our research has advanced our knowledge of COVID-19, created a successful diagnosis test, and led to vaccine development. Our work is impacting how we understand, treat, and prevent COVID-19 and future coronavirus outbreaks.
- Due to our development and testing of tenofovir (PMPA), HIV-infected mothers can give birth to HIV-free infants and HIV-infected people can live long and healthy lives. Tenofovir has become the key ingredient of successful prophylaxes, and is the most commonly used anti-HIV drug in the world.
- Our research found a link between environmental tobacco smoke exposure and adverse effects on prenatal, neonatal and childhood lung development, cognitive function, and brain development.
- Our research has advanced the understanding of developmental timelines in the kidney, and applied these findings to new protocols and tissue engineering approaches to regenerate kidneys damaged by obstructive disease.
- Novel development of therapies at the CNPRC are being used to treat patients with Alzheimer’s Disease. Ongoing research is demonstrating that reversal of damage and restoration of brain function is possible.
- Our research discovered a link between an infant’s temperament and asthma – research is leading towards the screening, prediction and prevention of lung disease in children.
- The Center has supported studies in young monkeys for IND (Investigational New Drug) applications for treating children with Pompe disease.
- Research at the CNPRC has shown that exposure to high levels of fine particle pollution (e.g. wildfire smoke) adversely affects both development of the immune system and lung function. A vaccine modeling HCMV infection proved safe and effective with the rhesus macaque model and developed the first-of-its-kind approach to preventing HCMV infection inducing broader immunological protection.
- BPA exposure in utero has been shown to cause adverse changes in fetal lung, oocyte and mammary gland development in CNPRC studies.
- In a major advance, our research defined a link between maternal auto-antibodies and increased risk of a child having autism.
- In order to successfully treat human disease with stem cells, physicians will require safe, reliable, and reproducible measures of engraftment and function of the donor cells. Studies at the CNPRC have revolutionized the ability to monitor stem and progenitor cell transplant efficiency in fetal and infant monkeys, and have applied new noninvasive imaging techniques that demonstrated long-term engraftment and safety.