OL PEJETA:Veterinarians have successfully harvested eggs from the last two survivingnorthern white rhinos, taking them one step closer to bringing the species backfrom the brink of extinction, scientists said in Kenya on Friday. Science isthe only hope for the northern white rhino after the death last year of thelast male, named Sudan, at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya where thegroundbreaking procedure was carried out Thursday.
Two females,Najin, 30, and daughter Fatu, 19, are the only survivors of the subspecies ofwhite rhino, and live under 24-hour armed guard at Ol Pejeta. However neitheris able to carry a calf. Fatu has degenerative lesions in her uterus and Najinhas weak hind legs which could cause complications if she fell pregnant.
The rhinosunderwent a highly risky procedure carried out by a team of international vets,which saw them anaesthetised for almost two hours, and their eggs extractedusing techniques that have taken years of research and development. "Itwas a great success, yesterday ten oocytes were harvested which was about thenumber we hoped for" said Jan Stejskal, of the Dvur Kralove Zoo in CzechRepublic, which in 2009 sent four northern white rhinos to Kenya in a bid toencourage them to breed.
Techniquedeveloped from scratch
He explained thatafter the discovery that the two females were infertile in 2014, over 15European zoos had given the green light for their their southern white rhinofemales to undergo the newly-developed egg extraction technique. In July 2018the first-ever rhino embryos were created, a hybrid of southern and northernwhite rhino.
The oocytes fromNajin and Fatu were airlifted to a laboratory in Italy, where they will befertilised with cryogenically frozen sperm -- of which there are samples fromfour deceased males -- likely by the end of the week. Now scientists have todevelop a technique to transfer the embryos into a surrogate rhino. This has beenattempted in southern white rhinos but has yet to be successful. Then it is arace against time to extract as many more eggs as possible from the livingnorthern white females.
The team workingon the project includes Ol Pejeta, Italian biotech laboratory Avantea, Czechzoo Dvur Kralove, the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and the German-based LeibnizInstitute for Zoo and Wildlife Research. "As scientists we are gaining somuch results and information about reproduction biology and assisted reproductionthat can and will help other species which are not so close to the verge ofextinction as the northern white rhino," said Frank Goritz, headveterinarian at the Leibnitz institute. Richard Vigne, the managing director ofOl Pejeta, said efforts to revive the dying species were crucial tohighlighting the "current crisis of extinction that we humans areresponsible for."
Wiped out bypoaching
There are fiverhino species remaining on earth, of which black and white rhinos are found inAfrica. The northern white rhino is generally considered a subspecies of whiterhino although some scientists believe it to be a sixth species. Rhinos havefew predators in the wild due to their size but have been devastated bypoaching for their horns -- used in traditional Chinese medicine. Modern rhinoshave plodded the earth for 26 million years. As recently as the mid-19thcentury there were more than one million in Africa. The western black rhino wasdeclared extinct in 2011.
If the IVF issuccessful, scientists say there may be several births of northern white rhinocalves, but the approach has its limits. Eggs can only be collected from thefemales three times a year, and a lack of genetic diversity could hamper thesurvival of the species. However the consortium of international scientistsknown as BioRescue is also trying to create artificial sex cells known asgametes via stem cell transformation from the frozen tissue of other, unrelatednorthern white rhinos, to diversify the gene pool.
The northernwhite rhino once roamed Uganda, the Central African Republic, Sudan and Chad.It is hoped a revived population -- which could take up to 70 years -- couldeventually be re-introduced into secure habitats in these areas. "Theylived in an area which really is not that safe right now, but there are someparts of their former range where they could be released," said Stejskal,adding there was hope for some conflict-torn nations to eventually provide asecure habitat in decades to come. - AFP