See how they run! Watch the mouse leave its normal partner in the dust in this video.
Scientists’ latest improvement on nature is a ‘mighty mouse’ that can run at 20 meters a minute for up to six hours before stopping. This genetically engineered mouse eats 60% more than normal mice but is still fitter and lives and breeds for longer.
“They are metabolically similar to Lance Armstrong biking up the Pyrenees*. They utilize mainly fatty acids for energy and produce very little lactic acid,” says Richard Hanson, biochemist at Case Western Reserve University and the man behind the new mice (press release). In the Journal of Biological Chemistry, Hanson details how over-expression of the gene for the enzyme phosphoenolypyruvate carboxykinases produces these effects, although it isn’t clear yet exactly what this enzyme does. This paper was originally released back in August.
A rather excitable article in the UK’s Independent says the new mouse is “raising the prospect that the discovery may one day be used to transform people’s capacities”. Personally I hope not, as the researchers also found the new mice were “markedly more aggressive” than controls. The paper quotes Hanson as saying:
We humans have exactly the same gene. But this is not something that you’d do to a human. It’s completely wrong. We do not think that this mouse model is an appropriate model for human gene therapy. It is currently not possible to introduce genes into the skeletal muscles of humans and it would not be ethical to even try.
The Telegraph also spoke to Hansen. He reiterated that “the possibility of using this procedure to enhance human performance is highly unlikely”.
Better, faster, stronger? Previous mighty mice
Se-Jin Lee made the original mighty mice, then he made them mightier!
World’s fattest mouse (and it doesn’t get diabetes) – New Scientist
Mice with increased muscle mass “forever fat free” – Nature Reviews Drug Discovery (subscription required)
*for more on Armstrong see Improved muscular efficiency displayed as Tour de France champion matures (pdf) and The Tour de France: a physiological review (abstract)