Animal-centric Care and Management

Dorte Bratbo Sørensen is a veterinarian and PhD in ethology and animal welfare. Currently, she is an associated professor in laboratory animal science at the University of Copenhagen, where she is teaching laboratory animal ethics, welfare and behavior. Dorte Bratbo Sørensen’s research interests evolve around animal behavior and animal welfare and her main research areas are evaluating the impact on different housing systems and various environmental enrichment or handling techniques on animal welfare and data quality. Another important area of interest is the implementation of training and socializing - especially the use of positive reinforcement training - as a way to enhance animal welfare and optimize the collection of physiological data. Together with Copenhagen Zoo, she arranges courses and seminars in laboratory animal positive reinforcement training and handling, and she is the founder of Centre for Laboratory Animal Training CeLAT.Co-editor Dr. Sylvie Cloutier currently works at the Canadian Council on Animal Care. Sylvie’s research interest is on factors affecting the behaviour and well-being of farm and laboratory animals, and the quality of human-animal interactions. She was a leader in introducing 'rat tickling' as a method to improve handling of laboratory rats. Co-editor Dr. Brianna N. Gaskill leads a research program focusing on welfare assessment of laboratory animals. She utilizes natural behavior, physiology, and affective state to assess an animal’s overall well-being. She is especially interested how better welfare can translate into better and more robust science. Her research interests include: applied ethology, enrichment design and application, improving husbandry techniques, and how environment can affect scientific results when not tailored to the animal’s needs and motivations.

"Animal-Centric Care and Management by Dorte Bratbo Sørensen, Sylvie Cloutier and Brianna Gaskill is a book that will easily fit into any library for training in animal science. It does a convincing job arguing for a new culture in animal science where researchers and caregivers cooperate to adjust experimental conditions to a species rather than require a species to adapt to the study conditions. It is suitable for any stakeholder working with live animals in science. The content is helpful to new personnel in the field, but also for experienced personnel, especially decision makers for equipment purchases, facility design, standard operating procedure review and development, or protocol reviews. It is my position that a manager would do well to have all their staff read this book... Animal welfare in the years ahead will hopefully be characterized with the quote “we can aim at well-being rather than the absence of distress”. This book will help get us there. I hope the current and subsequent generation of animal users look back and wonder how we could have done this work without that perspective. In short, please thoroughly digest this book; you and the animals you work with will be better off for it."Jason Allen, CALAS-ACSAL Member's Magazine, VOL 54, NO 5 • SPRING 2021"The essence of this book is to go beyond the notion of the 3Rs principles as originally described by Russell and Burch (1959), viewing these as a collection of ethical ideals not only to be adhered to, but to be further developed in all circumstances where animals are at risk of suffering... Animal-centric Care and Management is a book that generally strikes an excellent balance between the provision of detailed recommendations concerning methods of welfare enhancement without relying too heavily on the readers prior knowledge of the basic concepts."Johnny Roughan, University of Newcastle, UK in The UFAW Journal – Animal Welfare, Volume 31, Issue 1, February 2022"By introducing innovative and advanced ways of housing and caring for laboratory animals, this long-overdue book enables a much needed shift in animal research from a culture of exploitation to a culture of care, where research animals are treated as patients rather than mere measuring devices." Prof. Dr. Hanno Würbel, Division of Animal Welfare, Veterinary Public Health Institute, University of Bern"The book is comprehensive, well- written and exceedingly well laid out. The principles of Animal-centric careand management may sound a new idea but for many animal care staff it is what we have been doing for manyyears, although there is always room for new ideas. However, the concept of designing experiments studiesto consider the animals needs first rather than the scientific needs is something is entirely new. Althoughonly the common animals are covered, the principles are applicable to all species used in research, althoughsome in depth knowledge of some of the more unusual species needs to be acquired. I commend this book to you and would recommend that it is made available to all staff from the most junior technician to the head of teams using animals in research."Dr. Jas Barley, April 2021, Animal Technology and Welfare journal (IAT)"The style of writing throughout the book is engaging and encourages personal reflection of current animal behaviour and human interaction beliefs, knowledge and working practices within the laboratory animal field. Noteworthy chapters, for me, included the first four chapters of the book, these were probably the broadest in content (hence the appeal) and looked at human-animal bonds, the culture of care (currently a "hot topic" within the laboratory animal science sector), animal emotions and abnormal animal behaviours. It is surprising that so few animal husbandry management books have dedicated chapters to these important subjects previously and perhaps this "new approach" will become "the norm" in education, training and developing a greater understanding of our interactions with laboratory animals over future years. It is hoped that readers will champion changes in management of laboratory species that are focussed on the animals, their needs and their welfare, resulting in an increased awareness of an animal-centric culture."Angela Kerton, The Learning Curve (Development) Ltd., LASA Chair of the Scientific Programme, in LASA Forum Summer 2021

• Human-Animal Interactions. A Culture of Care. Animal Emotions and Moods - Why they matter. Abnormal behavior.Animal Learning – The science behind animal training. Animal Training – The Practical Approach. Zebrafish. Mice. Rats. The Laboratory Rabbit. The Laboratory Dog. The Non-Human Primates. Laboratory Pigs