ABSTRACT
Studies based on animal models are very useful to characterize lung diseases because they represent an essential intermediate step between in vitro experiments and clinical studies on human subjects. A number of animal models exist for a wide variety of pulmonary diseases, including emphysema, Žbrosis, asthma, and lung cancer [1-4]. Historically, histology and histomorphometry have been the techniques of choice to assess the evolution of a speciŽc disease in a suitable animal model. The advent of noninvasive imaging techniques suitable for small animal imaging, such as positron emission microtomography and x-ray microcomputed tomography (micro-CT), has widened the range of methods available to monitor disease evolution, eliminating the need to sacriŽce the animal [5].
