SJL mice were developed by James Lambert at The Jackson Laboratory in 1955 from three different sources of Swiss Webster mice. Mice display a very high incidence of reticulum cell sarcomas resembling Hodgkin's disease around one year of age. Sarcomas first appear in the Peyer's patches and mesenteric lymph nodes and later in the spleen, liver, thymus and other lymph nodes Most of the tumors are mixed-cell types classified as type B reticulum cell neoplasms, but a few are type A histiocytomas. This strain is also characterized by extreme agression in males and its susceptibility to experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) for multiple sclerosis research. SJL mice fail to develop atherosclerotic aortic lesions following 14 weeks on an atherogenic diet (1.25% cholesterol, 0.5% cholic acid and 15% fat).
