Animal-free in vitro: Adapting established Organisation for Economic Development Test Guideline in vitro assays so that they are free from animal-derived products

The Organisation for Economic Development (OECD) Guidelines for the Testing of Chemicals include a growing number of in vitro assays that can be used as alternatives to animal studies. There is increasing interest for these assays to also be free from animal-derived products to improve human relevance and reproducibility, and to reduce the use of animals.  

Sponsored by AstraZeneca and Unilever, and co-funded by Unilever, this Challenge aims to adapt established OECD Test Guideline in vitro assays so that they are free from animal-derived products, delivering a robust, human-relevant (and preferably chemically defined) version of the assays that demonstrates improved data quality and reproducibility.  

Phase 2 funding has been awarded to a team led by Dr Victoria Hutter, ImmuOne Ltd to deliver the project: Establishing in vitro OECD test guidelines assays (TG487 and TG455) free from animal-derived products.  

Full information about this Challenge is available on the Innovation Platform website.