lab ratn.
/ˈlab rat/, U.S. /ˈlæb ˌræt/ 1.
a. A rat subjected to experimentation for scientific research; a laboratory rat.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > endeavour > trial or experiment > [noun] > that which is experimented on or with
test object1830
corpus vile1860
lab rat1954
1954 Washington Post 23 Nov. 45/1 (headline) Human lung tissue grown in lab rats to be used in new smoke cancer test.
1965 Tucson (Arizona) Daily Citizen 6 Sept. 20/1 When researchers place a lab rat in a cold room he eats gluttonously to build up heat in his body.
1988 B. Sterling Islands in Net (1989) iv. 109 She imagined them running up and down the deck stairs of their strange steel world, hot and fervid, like hopped-up lab rats.
2002 N.Y. Times Mag. 15 Dec. 116/1 A lab rat wearing a tiny radio-controlled backpack, operated by a human working at a remote laptop computer.
b. figurative. A person or thing used as a subject for experiment; a person or thing that behaves like an animal used for experimentation.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > endeavour > trial or experiment > [noun] > that which is experimented on or with > one who is experimented on
experimenta1678
experimentized1832
experimentee1890
laboratory animal?1891
guinea pig1920
lab rat1979
1979 Irish Times 24 Nov. 12/4 They were constantly taunted by their fellow pilots that they were only glorified ‘klutzes’, lab rats.
1995 Empire Nov. 80/3 The maze for my moviegoing lab-rats was a smattering of the violent, the arty and the big-name features, to see which group were the most precious about their movies.
2003 Technol. Rev. Mar. 38/2 The researchers are working out the details of this ‘synthetic’ apomixis through experiments with their favourite ‘lab rat’, a small mustard plant called Arabidopsis thaliana.
2006 N.Y. Times (National ed.) 17 Dec. i. 1/5 ‘I was a guinea pig, a lab rat,’ Niki said of the experience.
2. slang. A scientist or student who spends long hours working in a laboratory.
ΚΠ
1962 Social Probl. 10 46/2 The old pathologist, a ‘lab rat’ with little interest in clinical problems, was not a proper colleague to other medical practitioners.
1990 J. Bishop & M. Waldholz Genome iii. 72 ‘I became what they call a lab rat,’ he says, noting that his grades ‘went to zilch’ as he ignored everything else but his lab experiments.
2006 A. Goodman Intuition i. ii. 15 Only one postdoc had wandered off. He was clearly a lab rat, although she couldn't quite place him.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1954