The Australia-based scientist said Thursday it produced the world’s first kangaroo embryo through in vitro fertilization, and welcomed it as an important step towards saving endangered marsupials.
The University of Queensland-led team ultimately adopted the technology in Eastern Grey Kangaroos with the aim of using IVF for use on scarce marsupials.
“Australia has the largest diversity of marsupial fauna on Earth, but has the highest rate of mammal extinction,” researcher Andres Gambini said in a statement.
“Our ultimate goal is to support the preservation of endangered marsupial species such as the koalas, the Tasmanian Devils, the wombats in the north and the lead beater possum.”
Scientists generated embryos by techniques that involve injecting a single sperm directly into a mature egg.
“Because the east gray kangaroos are overloaded, we collected eggs and sperm and used them as a model to adapt embryonic technology that is already being applied to livestock and humans,” Gambini said. “We are currently improving our techniques for collecting, culture and preserving marsupial eggs and sperm.”
Proper collaboration, funding and technological advances could enable births of IVF-supported marsupials within 10 years, the researchers said.
In Australia, the overall number of kangaroos fluctuates between 30 and 60 million, and is frequently suled to keep the population down.
Animals have a “boom and bust” population cycle – as food becomes abundant following a good rainy season, their numbers expand by tens of millions. However, several other marsupial populations are much more unstable.
For example, it is estimated that there are only 20,000-50,000 Tasmanian demons in the wild, before the mystical facial tumor disease that first hit the scene in the mid-1990s.
The Kangaroo IVF study was published in the peer-reviewed journal Reproductive, Fertility and Development.
