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A UCLA professor has vowed to stop experimenting on animals as a result of pressure from animal rights activists, UCLA officials and one activist group said.

Dario Ringach, an associate professor of neuroscience, sent an e-mail to the Animal Liberation Front on Tuesday titled, “You win,” promising to stop his animal testing, according to a statement released by the Animal Liberation Press Office.

University spokeswoman Judy Lin confirmed that Ringach did send the e-mail, but said there was no indication that he planned to leave the university.

The Animal Liberation Front also claimed responsibility for the June attempted firebombing of faculty member Lynn Fairbanks’ home. The group had accused Fairbanks of killing primates for experimentation purposes. UCLA officials denied the accusation.

The statement released by the Animal Liberation Press Office said Ringach did not give a specific reason for his decision, but did ask that animal rights groups leave his family alone.

“These groups have been harassing him and visiting his neighbors for a couple of years, and he does have small children,” Lin said.

The Animal Liberation Front has accused Ringach of cruelly experimenting on animals, including paralyzing and killing 30 macaque monkeys for vision experiments.

Though Lin said she did not know the nature of Ringach’s work at UCLA, the university has in the past denied this kind of animal experimentation. But the university did defend animal testing in a statement released after Ringach sent his e-mail to the Animal Liberation Front.

“Research involving laboratory animals has served as a vital cornerstone in the development of lifesaving procedures and medicines, from vaccines to open-heart surgery, organ transplantation to mental health treatment,” the statement read.

The statement also said the university had no plans to discontinue “humane” animal experimentation in its labs.

Lin said the animal rights groups, and not the testing itself, are the problem.

“This is a problem that’s much larger than UCLA. These groups have been harassing researchers all over the world,” she said. “It has reached terrorist level. The university is very disturbed by this.”

She added that UCLA is cooperating with the FBI, which is also conducting the investigation into the attempted firebombing of Fairbanks’ home.

Ringach could not be reached for comment.