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Associated Press
02/19/06
Iowa scientists protect genetics of valuable
research chickens
By Amy Lorentzen
Associated Press
AMES, Iowa – Iowa State University is working to safeguard the genetic material
of what scientists there say is an irreplaceable collection of research chickens.
The university’s Poultry Research Center houses more than two dozen special
chicken varieties that have been inbred for generations to share genetic material,
an important control factor in research, said Sue Lamont, an animal science
professor in charge of the center’s research lines.
“That allows us to understand when we are studying, for example, a disease,
what part … is due to the genetics as compared to the environment,” she said.
Because the chickens are isolated from generation to generation, both current
scientists and future ones can work with the birds and they will be consistent, she
said.
To ensure the research lines are not lost or destroyed, the university has
stockpiled 300 sperm samples from its roosters at a U.S. Department of
Agriculture research center in Colorado.
The move came after two tornadoes touched down in Ames last fall. The twisters
came close to the university, but did not heavily damage any campus property.
The previous year, animal rights activists broke into a University of Iowa
laboratory, freeing laboratory mice and rats and destroying data.
“We always need to think about any potential factor or event that might cause a
loss of valuable material,” Lamont said. “It might be deliberate – or inadvertent.”
The center’s research projects include examining chickens’ resistance to
disease, response to vaccinations, growth and skeletal strength.
Current technology allows only the male genetic material to be preserved. If Iowa
State’s chicken lines were wiped out, the samples would be used to inseminate
hens of other lines. The chickens would continue to be inbred for uniformity, to
maintain the genes scientists find most useful.
“Because this process would preserve those specific genes, that’s our major
interest,” Lamont said.
In Colorado, the poultry semen is cryogenically stored at the National Center for
Genetic Resources Preservation in Fort Collins. The center stores genetic
material from animals and crops important to the nation’s agriculture and
landscape, ensuring that they can be regenerated.
“From our perspective, this is a valuable contribution to the collection,” said
Harvey Blackburn, coordinator of the National Animal Germplasm Program, a
NCGRP research unit. “There are opportunities for people, at some point in the
future, to come and utilize the genetic resources that we have here in the
repository.”