Response to: Rat homologues to the human post neonatal period: Models for vulnerability to the Sudden infant death syndrome

摘要

We thank Dr. Harris for his kind remarks and interest in our research program. Comparing one species to another in terms of life span can be simplistic. Animals, in general, serve as models only and extrapolating data in real human time requires caution as commonly used species (rats, mice, and hamsters) are considered altri-cial as compared with human, whereas newborn lambs (ovine species) are judged as precocious. This notion is further highlighted by the fact that maturation and function of individual organs and even parts of a given organ demonstrate marked variability during fetal and neonatal development.1 The nervous system has been extensively studied for inter-species comparisons1'2 (http://translatingtime.org).