‘Frozen Zoo’ Could Help Save Endangered Animals
- 9 years ago
The San Diego Zoo’s “Frozen Zoo” is home to preserved tissue samples from more than 10,000 individual animals across various species which scientists hope to use to keep endangered animals from becoming extinct.
The “Frozen Zoo” is home to more than 10,000 individual animals across more than 1,000 species and subspecies.
It’s not an ecosystem in the Arctic but rather, stainless steel tanks cooled to -280 degrees Fahrenheit that hold animal tissue samples for preservation efforts.
Founded in 1972 at the San Diego Zoo's Institute for Conservation Research, the Frozen Zoo’s original mission was to preserve the skin-cell samples of endangered and extinct species.
Though future uses of this material was unknown at the time, scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have since been able to successfully turn skin samples of one primate into a type of stem cell culture.
Stem cells can theoretically be turned into any other kind of cell, which could possibly lead to new life.
The in
The “Frozen Zoo” is home to more than 10,000 individual animals across more than 1,000 species and subspecies.
It’s not an ecosystem in the Arctic but rather, stainless steel tanks cooled to -280 degrees Fahrenheit that hold animal tissue samples for preservation efforts.
Founded in 1972 at the San Diego Zoo's Institute for Conservation Research, the Frozen Zoo’s original mission was to preserve the skin-cell samples of endangered and extinct species.
Though future uses of this material was unknown at the time, scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have since been able to successfully turn skin samples of one primate into a type of stem cell culture.
Stem cells can theoretically be turned into any other kind of cell, which could possibly lead to new life.
The in