01/26/2024

Examining the Embryo Transplant That May Help Save the Northern White Rhino

The species once numbered 25,000 and ranged across four nations

The two loneliest rhinos in the world are the female known as Najin and her daughter, known as Fatu. They live in the Ol Pejeta conservancy, a 360 sq km (140 sq mi.) sanctuary in central Kenya. A lot of different animals representing a lot of different species call Ol Pejeta home, but Najin and Fatu are special: they are the world’s last remaining northern white rhinos, a species that once numbered 25,000 and ranged across what is now South Sudan, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Central African Republic. The near-death of the species is mostly due to poaching—with humans hunting down the rhinos in order to remove and sell their horns.

But Najin and Fatu may soon have company—if not in Ol Pejeta then in the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin, Germany. As the institute just announced, a group of researchers led by BioRescue, an international consortium of scientists and conservationists, has, for the first time, succeeded in transplanting a rhinoceros embryo fertilized in the lab into the womb of an adult female. This breakthrough implantation, say the researchers, will not be the last; if the methods they used to achieve the reproductive feat bear themselves out, the northern white rhino, now barely clinging to existence, could rebound across sanctuaries and perhaps even parts of the wild.

"The embryo transfer technique is well established for humans and domesticated animals such as horses and cows," said Thomas Hildebrandt, head of both BioRescue and the department of reproductive management at the Leibniz Institute, in a statement. "But for rhinos it has been completely uncharted territory. It took many years to get it right and we are overwhelmed that this technique works perfectly."

Please select this link to read the complete article from TIME.