The Potential of Minipigs in the Development of Anticancer Therapeutics: Species Comparison and Examples of Special Applications.

Minipigs are increasingly being used as an alternative to dog or monkey in nonclinical safety testing of pharmaceuticals since they share similar anatomical and physiological characteristics to humans. Integrative assessment of pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic data sets of drug candidates fromin silico,in vitro, andin vivoinvestigations form the basis for selecting the most relevant nonrodent species for toxicology studies. Developing anticancer therapeutics represents a special challenge for species selection due to their effects on multiple organ systems.