About the Authors

Carol Kilkenny

carol.kilkenny@nc3rs.org.uk

Affiliation The National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research, London, United Kingdom

Nick Parsons

Affiliation Warwick Medical School, University of Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom

Ed Kadyszewski

Affiliation Pfizer Global Research and Development, Groton, Connecticut, United States of America

Michael F. W. Festing

Affiliation Animal Procedures Committee, London, United Kingdom

Innes C. Cuthill

Affiliation School of Biological Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol, United Kingdom

Derek Fry

Affiliation Animals Scientific Procedures Inspectorate, Home Office, Shrewsbury, United Kingdom

Jane Hutton

Affiliation Department of Statistics, University of Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom

Douglas G. Altman

Affiliation Centre for Statistics in Medicine, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom

Competing Interests

Dr Michael Festing was a member of the NC3Rs Board from September 2004 to July 2007. Members of the NC3Rs board are not remunerated. In addition Dr Festing would like to declare that he teaches short courses on the design and statistical analysis of animal experiments to scientists who are applicants for Home Office licences, for which he is paid. There are no competing interests for any of the other authors.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: MF JH DGA. Performed the experiments: CK NP EK MF. Analyzed the data: CK NP EK MF IC DF JH DGA. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: NP. Wrote the paper: CK. Commented on the manuscript: IC DF DGA.