Animal Models of Hematopoietic Growth Factor Perturbations in Physiology and Pathology

The clinical use of hematopoietic growth factors (HGFs) is built on nearly 20 years of in vitro studies followed by preclinical animal studies. These laboratory and animal studies, undertaken before first use in humans, provided the basis for expectations of what the biologic effects in humans would be. Reflecting the available technologies, the initial animal studies primarily evaluated the in vivo effects of factor excess after administration of factors to various animal species and included transgenic models, particularly when the supply of factor itself was limiting or issues of chronic factor exposure were to be addressed. With the development of genetic technologies to disrupt genes in mice selectively, animal models of 2 Animal Models of Hematopoietic Growth Factor Perturbations in Physiology and Pathology