Drosophila or mouse-Which is better?

[LAKSH]

Hi guys, I am in need of a help. Your ideas would be very much helpful in my decision. Which is an easy and a convenient model to work with? Drosophila or mouse? I am working in Drosophila now, I have got an opportunity to work on an exciting research project in mice. But I am little hesitant if working with mice and mouse genetics would be complicated to manage than Drosophila. Also I wonder, if after some years if I would like to come back to Drosophila would it be possible, in a sense to pickup the methods on genetics .Any sort of answer would be helpful.
Thanks so much!

[kclo4x]

quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methuselah_Mouse_Prize



"One of the issues that has cropped up is whether the mouse is the most suitable model organism with which to research human aging interventions. It has been argued that the fruit fly (drosophila melanogaster) is an alternative model organism for aging studies. While the fruit fly has only 44% genetic similarity to humans, compared to 85% for the mouse, it is estimated that 75% of human disease genes have a fruit fly version [14]. The argument for the suitability of the fruit fly are that (1) lifespan of the fruitfly (40 days) means that more experiments can be performed, (2) the size and low maintenance per individual means hundreds of thousands can be screened per generation (3) the cost of laboratory maintenance is low (4) ethics approval is not required, and (5) low difficulty in generating genetic modifications in embryos, so it is less technically difficult to generate transgenic animals. However, with respect to surgical methods, the larger the animal, the easier to do surgery (such as bone marrow transplants).[15].

Based on the above considerations, the mouse is preferable if genetic similarity to humans is given highest weight, or if a question specific to the mouse was being asked; the fruit fly may be a better model for studies of many generations, or if large numbers of mutations are needed."

[mith]

The fruitfly may prove more fruitful in the short term.

[February Beetle]

I think the moust is obviously more complicated then Drosphila, but I think it is usually a good idea to have a broad experience. Try everything you can! I know this is not always the case, though.

[mcar]

Well, smaller organisms are easily subjected to artificial factors that could modify some of their internal properties faster for an instance.