Fish

Together with the neighbouring Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, our institute keeps around 25,000 zebrafish.

The zebrafish at our institute grow in Petri dishes during their first days of life. After around seven days, they are transferred to larger aquariums. At the age of three to four months, they are then transferred to the holding room for the adult fish. In the wild, zebrafish live in loose fish communities and are, therefore, kept in shoals. Around 5 individuals per litre live in the 3.5 to 12-litre aquariums. Keeping zebrafish in densities of less than four sexually mature animals per litre can be problematic as the fish would begin to defend territories. Large water treatment systems and high flow rates ensure optimum water quality, that is regularly monitored. The high-quality food is specially tailored to the needs of the zebrafish and takes into account the various stages of development from larvae to sexually mature fish. In the wild, the animals normally live for around one year, and they are in captivity for two years or more.