Feb.
5, 2013 — Meet Klondike, the western hemisphere's first puppy born from a
frozen embryo. He's a beagle-Labrador retriever mix, and although neither of
those breeds are endangered, Klondike's very existence is exciting news for
endangered canids, like the red wolf.
Now
nine months old, Klondike's beagle mother was fertilized using artificial
insemination. The resulting embryos were collected and frozen until Klondike's
surrogate mother, also a beagle, was ready to receive the embryo.
This
frozen embryo technique is one of many reproductive technologies that can be
used to conserve endangered species such as wild canids. Conducted by
researchers at Cornell's Baker Institute for Animal Health and the Smithsonian
Conservation Biology Institute, the process of freezing materials such as
fertilized eggs -- cryopreservation -- provides researchers with a tool to
repopulate endangered species. Because dogs cycle are able to sustain a
pregnancy only once or twice a year, being able to freeze canine embryos is
especially important to coordinate timing for transfer into the surrogates.
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