Bangladeshi scientist leads team to horse embryo tranfser in Japan

Bangladeshi academic MA Hannan
Bangladeshi academic MA Hannan

A Bangladesh scientist leads a research team at a Japanese university to transfer horse embryo in a historic bid to create a high quality horses.

The Bangladeshi academic, MA Hannan, teamed up with Japanese scientists and successfully transferred the sperm of a European donor horse to a Japanese mare.

Following the successful transplantation of the embryo on 10 April this year, the Japanese mare gave birth to a healthy foal. This is this the first successful equine embryo transplantation in Japan.

This three-year successful research has also opened up new horizons to develop high quality cattle and buffaloes in Bangladesh.

The research was conferred under professor Yasu Nambor of the Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine in Japan.

The findings of the research were published in the Journal of Veterinary Medical Science recently.

The researchers exported frozen sperm of Irish Connemara pony and implant the sperm into womb of a Hokkaido pony.

MA Hannan, an assistant professor at the Gono Bishwabidyalay in Bangladesh, is now in Japan for his post-doctoral studies.

Asked about the matter online, Hannan said, “I want to apply the same technology on cattle in Bangladesh as there’s a crisis of high quality cattle in our country.”

Scientist Hannan completed his honours from Bangladesh Agriculture University and then went to University of Wisconsin in USA for Masters. He later obtained his PhD degree from Japan’s Osaka Prefecture University.

The researchers also said usually a cow or buffalo or a horse gives birth to single offspring in a year. Through this transplantation technology more than one offspring can be produced in the same period of time.

This technology may bring huge success to upgrade the cattle and buffaloes in the country, said Farida Yeasmin Bari, professor of Surgery and Obstetrics department at Bangladesh Agriculture University while commenting on the new embryo transfer technology.

*This report appeared in Prothom Alo print edition has been rewritten in English by Toriqul Islam