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Barbara Durrant, director of reproductive sciences at the San Diego Zoo. She's working on IVF techniques for white rhinos along side Hildebrandt in Berlin.
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"We don't know what all the pitfalls are going to be," said Dr. But reproduction in rhinos is complicated adapting the in vitro fertilization process to rhinos has its own unique challenges. In vitro fertilization procedures are the same in principal whether it's performed in humans or other animals - mature eggs are extracted from a uterus, fertilized with semen in a lab and then implanted back into a uterus in hopes that one or more of the fertilized eggs will implant and create a viable pregnancy. Suni died in 2014. Four years later, Sudan, the last male northern white rhino on earth, died from natural causes at the age of 45.īut those most passionate about saving the subspecies did not give up hope. Even though the rhinos mated, they never produced a new calf. They were relocated to Kenya after living in a zoo in the Czech Republic for years in hopes that the rhinos would procreate at a faster rate if they lived in a climate that was more like their natural habitat. The two female rhinos arrived in 2009 along with two male northern white rhinos, Sudan and Suni. Mutai has cared for Najin and Fatu as long as they've resided at Ol Pejeta. "And the number declined until there's only two left now," Mutai said. By the 1980's, the population had been obliterated to only 31 living in Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In the 1960's, there were 2,000 living in the wild according to Ol Pejeta Conservancy. So most of this rhino was affected by the civil war in those countries, poachers taking advantage of killing nearly most of them because there wasn't good security for them," explains Zacharia Mutai, head caretaker for Najin and Fatu at Ol Pejeta Conservancy. "In those countries, there was civil war. Poachers took advantage of illegal demand in parts of Asia for rhino horn. Armed conflict in the region left the rhinos vulnerable for decades. Northern white rhinos, a subspecies of white rhino, used to roam throughout countries in the central region of Africa, including Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Chad, Sudan and Central African Republic. Rebounding a population back from just two animals has many uncertainties. Some of his colleagues think his timeline is ambitious.
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Thomas Hildebrandt is one of the scientists on a mission to save the northern white rhino. “My internal goal and hope is that we will be successful, in three years we will see the birth of a northern white rhino,” he said in a phone interview with USA TODAY from Berlin. “The overarching idea is that we have in 20 years a solid population of northern white rhinos which can be reintroduced in the wild.” Thousands of miles beyond their Kenyan enclosure is a team of worldwide scientists who are determined to save the subspecies one innovative procedure at a time.ĭr. The two rhinos don't pay much attention to the rotation of journalists and photographers who also come to visit, taking pictures as the world waits to learn the future of this critically endangered subspecies. Najin and Fatu simply go on with their routine of grazing and frequent daytime naps.