JP2002058373A - Rearing rack apparatus useful for both positive pressure and negative pressure - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a rearing rack apparatus for freely changing an environment of a rearing zone to either of a positive pressure state or a negative pressure state by the direction of an air flow of a fan in a rearing rack apparatus for rearing laboratory animals and making an experimental environment excellent for both animals housed in a cage and researchers engaged in an experiment in a laboratory. SOLUTION: When an exhaust port (7) of a fan (5) is directly connected to a duct (2) and the fan is operated, air in the laboratory is continuously sent through the duct (2) and a filter (3) to a rearing zone (4) and the rearing zone is made into a positive pressure state of somewhat a higher atmospheric pressure than that of the laboratory. On the contrary, when the fan is rotated by 90 degrees, an intake port (6) is directly connected to the duct and the fan is operated, air in the rearing zone is sucked and discharged through the filter (3) and the duct 2 into the laboratory. Since air is continuously sucked in the rearing zone, the rearing zone is made into a negative state of somewhat a lower atmospheric pressure than that of the laboratory.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a device capable of housing or maintaining laboratory animals such as mice and rats for long periods or temporarily for medical, scientific, environmental and other experiments and research.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in order to perform a specific experiment or research using an experimental animal, the animal is classified according to the type of the experiment or research, and an animal breeding rack installed in a laboratory for each classification. Various experimental data are collected while housed in a device and isolated. In order to obtain accurate experimental data, it is required to keep animals in a healthy state by always keeping the environment of the whole lab, especially the breeding rack device breeding zone, clean. In order to maintain the environment of the breeding zone in good condition, the air taken from the laboratory should be sterilized with a filter and then sent to the breeding zone. There is no danger of animals being contaminated by infectious sources. Conversely, in order to prevent the air discharged from the breeding zone from becoming the source of infection and contaminating the people engaged in research in the laboratory, the air in the breeding zone should be sucked and the air pressure should be slightly lower than that of the laboratory. If the sucked air is discharged into the room after sterilization by a filter, there is no danger of contaminating the laboratory. In this way, by using the pressure in the breeding zone in a positive pressure state or a negative pressure state according to the type of experiment, a favorable environment can be created for both humans and animals. In order to create these two different states of positive and negative, the laboratory is equipped with a dedicated breeding rack device that maintains the positive pressure condition and a dedicated cage that maintains the negative pressure condition in the laboratory. The animals have to be manually transferred to their respective cages accordingly.

[0003]

The task of transferring experimental animals to a cage in a positive pressure state and a rearing rack apparatus in a negative pressure state by human hands is a very time-consuming task and leads to an increase in labor costs. It is a factor. In addition, increasing the chance of direct contact with experimental animals with human hands causes the transfer of infection sources such as bacteria from animal to human and vice versa, increasing the risk of infection. I have.
Moving from cage to cage can physically add extra stress to laboratory animals, resulting in increased costs for the entire experiment, the risk of infection for the researchers themselves, and accurate data that is also the purpose of the experiment. There are various problems, such as adversely affecting the collection of fish.

[0004]

The structure of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings to solve the above problems. As shown in FIG. 1, the central and lower parts of the cage body 1 are constituted by a rearing zone, the upper part of the main body is constituted by a ventilator, and the rearing zone is brought into a positive pressure state, as shown in FIG. The air in the laboratory is sucked from the air inlet 6 of the above, and the sucked air is guided through the duct 2, passed through the filter 3 and discharged to the breeding zone 4. Due to this air flow, infection sources such as germs contained in the air in the laboratory are completely removed by the filter, and clean air is always supplied to the breeding zone. At the same time, the breeding zone is maintained at a positive pressure, which is slightly higher than that of the laboratory, because the clean air that has been sterilized is continuously fed by the fan. Therefore, there is no danger of infectious sources such as bacteria entering the breeding zone from the laboratory.
Laboratory animals can be bred in a favorable environment. (FIG. 4 shows the air flow in a positive pressure state.) Conversely, the fan 5 is set to 90
The duct that is directly connected to the exhaust port of the fan in the positive pressure state,
Since it is directly connected to the completely opposite intake side, the air flow naturally reverses to the positive pressure state, and the air in the breeding zone 4 is now sucked, passes through the filter 3, and is filtered by the filter to clean the source of infection. Fresh air is exhausted to the laboratory. Since air is continuously sucked from the breeding zone, the breeding zone is in a negative pressure state where the pressure is slightly lower than that in the laboratory, and no infectious source is discharged from the breeding zone to the laboratory. Therefore, humans, such as researchers involved in experiments, can engage in experiments in a comfortable environment without worrying about infection from animals. (Fig. 5 shows the flow of air under negative pressure)

[0005]

According to the present invention, in order to breed an experimental animal, the intake port of the fan is directly connected to the duct, and the breeding zone is maintained in a positive pressure state to breed the animal in a clean environment. In experiments where the danger of discharging harmful substances, such as the administration of dangerous substances to animals, is anticipated, rotate the fan 90 degrees, connect the exhaust port of the fan directly to the duct, and switch the breeding zone to a negative pressure state. Do.

[0006]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS In the embodiment of the present invention shown in FIG. 1, the attachment position of the exhaust device is located at the upper portion of the main body, but may be at the lower portion or the horizontal portion depending on the shape of the main body.

[0007]

The cage according to the present invention can create the environment of the breeding zone freely and positively and negatively with one unit. Therefore, the conventional breeding rack apparatus having two positive pressures and two negative pressures is required, but only one breeding rack apparatus is required, and the experiment cost can be reduced. Further, since the movement of the animal at the time of switching between the positive and negative directions is not required, various problems associated with the movement can be solved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a partial perspective view of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a partial perspective view of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of use of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a partial perspective view of the present invention.

[Description of Signs] 1 is a main body 2 is a duct 3 is a filter 4 is a breeding zone 5 is a fan 6 is a fan intake port 7 is a fan exhaust port

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) A ventilation device provided above a rearing device. (B) The breeding zone, the intake device, and the exhaust device are provided in the main body 1. (C) The fan 5 that rotates 90 degrees is provided. A laboratory animal cage configured as described above.