The northern white rhino could be saved with an embryonic breakthrough

A significant breakthrough of embryos could help save one of the most endangered animals on the planet, and many others in the future.

Earlier this year, sad news announced the death of the last male white rhinoceros. This put the species on the brink of extinction with apparently no natural breeding chance as the only two known species are females.

However, a major breakthrough in embryo research could be on the verge of reinvigorating the species, according to the BBC.

In an article published by Nature Communications Professor Thomas Hildebrandt of the Leibniz Institute for Zoological and Wildlife Research in Berlin and a team of international researchers revealed that they had recovered the sperm of two dead male rhinoceros. 19659003] Using embryos made from eggs of a closely related subspecies, they were able to perform IVF treatment in the hope that a white rhinoceros baby North could born in as short as three years.

However, the team explained that she had to create an entirely new extraction device, just to get an oocyte (egg) from the female rhinoceros.

Even with the rhinoceros under anesthesia, the procedure is very risky because there is a crucial artery right next to the ovaries, and that could bleed the rhinoceros if it is punctured.

Confident That It Can Work

When the eggs were retrieved, the rhinoceros sperm – many years old at this time – was inserted into the egg and then electrically stimulated to create a fusion between them.

"Everyone believed that there was no hope for this subspecies," Hildebrandt said. "But with our knowledge now, we are very confident that it will work with northern white rhino eggs and that we will be able to produce a viable population."

The challenge now is to find an effective way to accumulate rhinoceros eggs since only two of these species still exist, but it is likely that all embryos produced will have to be cryopreserved up to that we find a substitute.

Otherwise, attempts to prevent total extinction are based on the total elimination of poaching. Dr. Terri Roth of the Cincinnati Zoo told the BBC: "Appropriate legislation must be pbaded, resources for enforcing the regulations must be respected, provided and the law maintained."