Tashkent State Medical University
Department of Informatics, Biophysics, and Normal Physiology
In May 2012, we co-sponsored a presentation and lecture tour through Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Our project partner Dimitrij Leporskij and Nick Jukes, coordinator of the international network InterNICHE, spent five weeks traveling through the two Central Asian countries, presenting humane teaching tools at eight universities in four cities.
One year later, in June 2013, university lecturer Oisha Olavia from the Department of Informatics, Biophysics, and Normal Physiology at the Tashkent State Medical University in the capital of Uzbekistan signed an agreement. In the past, parts of the brains of cats, pigeons, and frogs were removed to study the effects. Frogs were decapitated alive to extract their nerves, muscles, and hearts for experiments. A large part of these experiments—performed annually on 600 frogs, 45 pigeons, 15 cats, and 5 dogs—had already been replaced by course leader Oisha Olavia several years earlier. Biopac, a device for student self-experiments, was used instead.
With our support, the remaining animal experiments were now replaced. The department received models as well as a large collection of software and films on physiology from us by mail.
Photos from the May 2012 tour:
The interest among university faculty during the two-day event was extraordinarily high.
In the office of Prof. Bokhodir A. Magrupov (right), head of the Institute of Normal and Pathological Physiology and Anatomy. In the institute’s physiology course, many animal experiments had already been replaced with humane alternatives. The head of the physiology course, Oisha T. Alyavia (center), is a true pioneer. Ten years ago, she contacted the American company Biopac, which manufactures equipment for student self-experiments, and insisted that the user manual had to be available in Russian. The company actually created a Russian translation just for her, and even sent a technician to Tashkent to install the device.