Zebrafish (Danio rerio) as a Model Organism

Animals as model organisms, the silent sentinels, stand watch over the environmental health of the world. These are non-human animal species which can be used to understand specific biological processes and to obtain informations which can provide an insight into working of other organisms. Among the model organisms, the zebrafish (Danio rerio) is one of the best leading models to study developmental biology, cancer, toxicology, drug discovery, and molecular genetics. In addition, the zebrafish is increasingly used as a genetic model organism for aquaculture species and in toxicogenomics and also to generate zebrafish disease models for application in human biomedicines. This tiny fish is a versatile model organism for many fields of research because of its easy maintenance, breeding, and transparent body during early development.