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Review
. 2009 Jan 15:4:2.
doi: 10.1186/1747-5341-4-2.

Are animal models predictive for humans?

Niall Shanks  1 , Ray Greek, Jean Greek
Affiliations
Review

Are animal models predictive for humans?

Niall Shanks et al. Philos Ethics Humanit Med. .

Abstract

It is one of the central aims of the philosophy of science to elucidate the meanings of scientific terms and also to think critically about their application. The focus of this essay is the scientific term predict and whether there is credible evidence that animal models, especially in toxicology and pathophysiology, can be used to predict human outcomes. Whether animals can be used to predict human response to drugs and other chemicals is apparently a contentious issue. However, when one empirically analyzes animal models using scientific tools they fall far short of being able to predict human responses. This is not surprising considering what we have learned from fields such evolutionary and developmental biology, gene regulation and expression, epigenetics, complexity theory, and comparative genomics.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Human vs animal bioavailability 1. Graph generously provided by James Harris PhD, who presented it at the Center for Business Intelligence conference titled 6th Forum on Predictive ADME/Tox held in Washington, DC September 27–29, 2006 and is adapted from data that appeared in Grass GM, Sinko PJ. Physiologically-based pharmacokinetic simulation modelling. Adv Drug Deliv Rev. 2002 Mar 31;54(3):433–5.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Human vs animal bioavailability 2. Graph generously provided by James Harris PhD, who presented it at the Center for Business Intelligence conference titled 6th Forum on Predictive ADME/Tox held in Washington, DC September 27–29, 2006 and is adapted from data that appeared in Arun K Mandagere and Barry Jones. Prediction of Bioavailability. In (Eds) Han van de Waterbeemd, Hans Lennernäs, Per Artursson, and Raimund Mannhold. Drug Bioavailability: Estimation of Solubility, Permeability, Absorption and Bioavailability (Methods and Principles in Medicinal Chemistry) Wiley-VCS 2003. P444–60.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Olsen figure 1.
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Figure 4
Olsen figure 3.
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Figure 5
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