Animal Care

Our Team

Rutgers Animal Care, a division of the Office for Research, is comprised of Research Core Services, Controlled Substances in Research, Comparative Medicine Resources and the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee. The team supports the research mission of Rutgers in biomedical research areas including, but not limited to, genomic projects, pharmacokinetic and ADME studies, feasibility studies, surgical models, xenograft models and chemotherapeutic studies. Rutgers Animal Care also provides a comprehensive program of animal care including protocol review, a duly-constituted animal care committee, occupational health and laboratory safety, and full-time veterinary care.

Comprehensive Animal Care

We provide a comprehensive program of animal care including protocol review, a duly-constituted animal care committee, occupational health and laboratory safety, and full-time veterinary care.

• Animal research projects are supported by an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), a safety program under the direction of Rutgers Environmental and Health Safety (REHS), and a comprehensive program of occupational health for animal workers.
• Rutgers animal facilities are USDA-registered and accredited by AAALACi, an association widely recognized for its standards of excellence in laboratory animal care.
• As an accredited facility, Rutgers complies with all requirements of the Animal Welfare Act & PHS Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.  Rutgers has an Animal Welfare Assurance with the Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare (OLAW), a requirement for conducting any PHS/NIH - funded animal work.

Ethical Animal Treatment

Once it is determined that alternative methods such as cell culture and computer models cannot be used, a conscious decision is made to use laboratory animals in research as it is that both animals and humans are the ultimate beneficiaries. Animal Care works closely with the Rutgers Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUC) to provide the highest quality animal care and veterinary oversight of our research animals in support of this commitment to humane animal research.