Researchers at Fort Collins-based XY Inc. have coaxed a tabby cat to have all-female babies and helped polo players in South America breed the fillies they prefer.
The scientists enticed English dairy cows to have fewer male offspring – which are often butchered at birth.
Until recently, the company couldn’t figure out why its sperm-sorting gender-selection technique didn’t work on dogs.
Wednesday, however, XY officials presented a litter of five black Lab puppies, born in Fort Collins on Jan. 16 after scientists sorted their dad’s sperm to try to influence their gender.
While only three of the five new puppies are females – the preferred sex for seeing-eye Labradors – company president Mervyn Jacobson said the wiggly pups are a “proof of concept,” that the technique should eventually work in dogs.
“It’s like learning to fly. The first airplane proved the principle by flying a few hundred feet,” Jacobsen said.
“We have shown that canine sperm can survive the sorting process,” he said.
Gender selection in livestock and work animals saves millions of animal lives, Jacobson said, as owners often kill the “wrong” gender offspring.
Last fall, XY collaborated with the Audubon Nature Institute in New Orleans, on the tabby cat work, which produced a litter of five females.
Audubon senior scientist Earle Pope called the sex-selection success “critical” for breeding programs designed to save endangered big cats such as snow leopards.
XY, which has 20 employees, has spent a decade refining a sperm-sorting technique originally developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Jacobsen said.
Sperm flow single-file through a microscopic gate, illuminated by a laser. A computer detects differences between sperm that produce females (Xs) and those that make males (Ys), directing them into different test tubes.
Experts then inseminate animals artificially. XY promises 90 percent accuracy for most clients.
Human sperm sorting is still only experimental, but it’s less controversial than other types of gender selection methods used in fertility clinics today, said Denver fertility specialist William Schoolcraft.
One technique is to screen test-tube embryos for gender-selected pre-implantation, but that means embryos of the undesired sex are destroyed – unethical to many, Schoolcraft said.
Staff writer Katy Human can be reached at 303-954-1910 or khuman@denverpost.com.
