# Automatic Watering System for the Cancer Center animal facility at New Jersey Medical School

> **NIH NIH R24** · RUTGERS BIOMEDICAL AND HEALTH SCIENCES · 2024 · $336,200

## Abstract

PROJECT ABSTRACT
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (RU)-New Jersey Medical School (NJMS) requests funds to
purchase and outfit an automatic watering delivery system (AWS) to serve the needs of the current as well as
future expanding numbers of rodent cages in the Cancer Center (CC) building vivarium in Newark. The current
facility was built in 2004 with 2200 Individually ventilated cages (IVC) with city water provided through water
bottles. NJMS has seen a big increase in biomedical research and with it the need for use of animals in the
research. To accommodate the growing number of NIH funded investigators using animals, we have outfitted
the facility with high-density IVC caging, increasing the cage capacity of the facility to 6000 cages within the
existing footprint. Currently, the water source for the animals is city water that is bottled and autoclaved prior to
providing them to the animals. This task is very labor intensive and time consuming. Also, the increased
amount of water bottles increases the chances for repetitive motion injuries to our animal care staff due to the
many tasks associated with providing the water bottles- removing caps, putting on the caps, carrying heavy
baskets with the autoclaved water etc. An AWS that supplies chlorinated reverse osmosis (RO) water proposed
in this project will significantly reduce the labor costs (estimated 2 FTEs), improve worker safety, provide
constant and consistent high quality water and increase the rigor and reproducibility of research. The
animal care technician time savings will be redirected to more animal care needs. The labor cost savings will
result in less per diem costs for the investigators. The equipment requested fits existing facility dimensions
and utilizes most of the existing physical infrastructure. To ensure equipment operation Rutgers University will
pay for the annual maintenance contract for proper maintenance of the equipment.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10985204
- **Project number:** 1R24OD037699-01
- **Recipient organization:** RUTGERS BIOMEDICAL AND HEALTH SCIENCES
- **Principal Investigator:** Bhupinder Singh
- **Activity code:** R24 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $336,200
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-07-15 → 2025-07-14

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10985204

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10985204, Automatic Watering System for the Cancer Center animal facility at New Jersey Medical School (1R24OD037699-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10985204. Licensed CC0.

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