The scid-beige double mutant mice were perfectly fertile and could be propogated out many generations - at least F6 when I was there. We did have a very good germ-free colony and skilled animal techs who knew how to handle them.
Also, I should have said that we got the BALB-beige mice from a germ-free facility - it might have been Fox Chase - I don't remember.
My project involved neonatal HSC transplants [fully allogeneic] and required newborns, so having successful breeders was very important to me.
When I worked at the Medical Biology Institute in San Diego back in the '90s, I crossed C.B-17 scid mice to BALB/c-beige mice. They breed well. Scid is easy to establish [no serum Ig] and beige can be scored by immunohistochemistry of leukocytes on blood smears - either Sudan Black B or myeloperoxidase staining. The hardest part was establishing the Igh haplotype, which had to be done by Southern blotting.
I left that laboratory, and the institute closed down not long after. You might want to contact either Drs. Don Mosier or Bruce Torbett at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, or possibly Dr. Roy Riblet at La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology - provided he hasn't retired - and see if any of them still have those mice and can supply you with breeding pairs. Dr. Mosier also sent to mice to someone at the NIH, but I do not remember who it was.
Alternately, someone at the University of Guelph in Canada bred C57BL6-beige to C.B-17-scid mice at the same time. I don't remember the name of the group, or if those mice are available through any breeder such as Taconic Labs. I am pretty sure that Jackson Labs does not have those mice.
Thanks Gary! So we purchased some actual SCID Beige mice that are the litter from the CB.17 Scid and BALB/c-beige crosses from Fox Chase. Do you remember if you could still breed the litters of the C.B-17 and BALB/c-beige mice (the SCID-Beige products) with each other? Thanks so much for your help!
I think you have to ballance between the requirements to work extremely pathogen-free (to avoid the Scid mice to catch infections which otherwise might be well tolerated by immunocompetend strains) and the sometimes detrimental effect of a completely isolated cage atmosphere on the mating success. We observed for other mouse strains that mating is worse when they are kept in individually ventilated cages. A "smelly" mouse facility might be bad for the animal care takes, but better for the mice.
Michael
The scid-beige double mutant mice were perfectly fertile and could be propogated out many generations - at least F6 when I was there. We did have a very good germ-free colony and skilled animal techs who knew how to handle them.
Also, I should have said that we got the BALB-beige mice from a germ-free facility - it might have been Fox Chase - I don't remember.
My project involved neonatal HSC transplants [fully allogeneic] and required newborns, so having successful breeders was very important to me.
I also did this about 10 years ago. It is ok but the lit is quite small.