Modelos animales: Desarrollo de la línea de ratones congénicos BALB/C.Cg-Ctsl^nkt

In the last 40 years, the development of murine models has made possible remarkable achievements in the study and the therapeutic of many human and animal diseases. On the other hand, the use of backcross programs has allowed the development of congenic strains of rodents, that is the introgression of a mutation onto a recipient genetic background. The spontaneous nackt mutation (nkt) is characterized by impaired CD4 T-cell development and generalized alopecia, due to abnormal epidermal differentiation and hair follicle cycling. The introgression of this locus onto BALB/c, one of the most widely used mouse inbred strains, made possible the development of a new murine model. The objective of this work was to develop a full congenic BALB/c-nkt (nomenclature: BALB/c.Cg-Ctsl^nkt) through repeated backcross-intercross rounds. The development of this congenic strain was continued until the N10 generation, where the introgressed segment of the donor chromosome carrying the mutation is supposed to be very small. This congenic strain, available in our country, represents an important tool for immunology and dermatological studies and represents a spontaneous knock-out animal model for the cathepsin L gene.