Conservation of wild animals by assisted reproduction and molecular marker technology.
Wild animals are an integral component of the ecosystem. Their decimation due to abrupt natural calamities or due to gradual human intervention would be disastrous to the ecosystem and would alter the balance in nature between various biotic components. Such an imbalance could have an adverse effect on the ecosystem. Therefore, there is an urgent need to put an end to the ever increasing list of endangered species by undertaking both in situ and ex situ conservation using tools of modern biology, to ascertain the degree of genetic variation and reproductive competence in these animals. This review highlights the development and use of molecular markers such as microsatellites, minisatellites, mitochondrial control region, cytochrome b and MHC loci to assess the genetic variation in various Indian wild animals such as the lion, tiger, leopard and deer. The review also presents data on the semen profile of the big cats of India. Reproductive technologies such as cryopreservation of semen and artificial insemination in big cats are also highlighted.
Shivaji
S
S
Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Uppal Road, Hyderabad 500 007, India. shivas@ccmb.res.in
Kholkute
S D
SD
Verma
S K
SK
Gaur
Ajay
A
Umapathy
G
G
Singh
Anju
A
Sontakke
Sadanand
S
Shailaja
K
K
Reddy
Anuradha
A
Monika
S
S
Sivaram
V
V
Jyotsna
B
B
Bala
Satyare
S
Ahmed
M Shakeel
MS
Bala
Aruna
A
Chandrashekar
B V N
BV
Gupta
Sandeep
S
Prakash
Surya
S
Singh
Lalji
L
D000818:Animals; D000835:Animals, Wild; D001709:Biotechnology; D004624:Embryo Transfer; D007315:Insemination, Artificial / Q000662:veterinary*; D012099:Reproductive Techniques / Q000662:veterinary*