The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) is a US federal research agency established in 1966 with the mandate "to reduce the burden of human illness and disability by understanding how the environment influences the development and progression of human disease." Based in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, NIEHS is one of 27 divisions of the National Institutes of Health, within the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Animal Use Activities
NIEHS research programs are vast. The Institute's Division of Intramural Research is organized into three main programs––environmental biology, environmental disease and medicine, and environmental toxicology––which in turn consist of a number of distinct branches, laboratories and core facilities, many of which make liberal use of animals. For example, NIEHS maintains a facility dedicated to the engineering and breeding of targeted transgenic and knockout mice. In the context of regulatory toxicology, most intramural animal use at NIEHS occurs within the following areas:
NIEHS also houses and funds the National Toxicology Program (NTP), which conducts extensive animal testing under its chemical nomination, phototoxicity, reproductive toxicity, rodent carcinogenesis, and other programs.
In addition to its in-house programs, the NIEHS Division of Extramural Research and Training provides extensive funding for environmental health sciences research by universities, hospitals and other institutions through small business grants, as well as through integrated, priority programs operated by the Institute (e.g., NanoHealth).
Alternatives Policies & Actions
NIEHS has undertaken and funded substantial research to develop and validate 3Rs methods. For example, NIEHS maintains an Alternative Test Systems and Ecotoxicology Faculty to "further Institute-based evaluation of new test systems, particularly those that are mechanistically based and/or involve transgenics, nonmammalian species, in vitro systems, or computer-based prediction systems." In addition, as home to the NTP, NIEHS provides funding and infrastructure support for the NTP's high throughput screening and other 3Rs initiatives, while also providing administrative and infrastructure support to the US Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM).
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