Naming mouse strains

Naming mouse strains

There are internationally accepted rules to name transgenic and knock-out mice. See the following links:

Mouse Nomenclature Rules and Guidelines

These are suggestions about how to name mice, following the above quoted rules:
 

Transgenic mice:
 

promoter and gene combined acronym^mutation - founder# - mouse#

 example: lckB6 -16 -123
 example: eµSVIRTA2^tm -2 -65

Breeding of two transgenic strains will be:

promoter and gene combined acronyms^mutation - mouse#

 example: CD19Cre-CMVHAB6^lox -8

The promoter and gene names may be combined in order to have a very short, but explicative 4-6 letter heading
Strain has been omitted, because most of the mice used are outbred. Inbred lines may be indicated after the founder with an i   for inbred.
mice are numbered sequentially as they are born. A progressive numbering is used for each line. This will allow toe identification of mice, and an unique number for each mouse in the line.

Knock-out mice (Targeted mutations):
 

 gene^mutation - ES cell clone - mouse#

example: B6^D -T1/8-28

Transgenic and KO breeding:
 

KO nameTG acronym^mutation - mouse#

 example: p53^null -lckB6 -123
 example: B6^D -MD4 -65

Individual mice will be reported as

Transgenics:

^TG or ^TG/- or ^TG/TG when transgenics

Knock-out:

+/+ or +/- or -/-
+/+, +/D and D/D