www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

A Centrally-aided research project of the Calicut University Zoology
department has made a path-breaking feat in the field of genetic engineering
and cloning, which can have a tremendous impact in the export of prawns, the
country?s major source of foreign exchange, February 2007.

Aided by the Department of Bio-Technology (DBT) under the Union Ministry
of Science and Technology, this 3-year research project in cloning has
successfully isolated two growth regulating genes in the giant fresh water
prawns (macro brachium rosenbergii) at the university laboratory.

??Now the clone is at our disposal which has to undergo further procedures
of genetic engineering before it can be introduced in prawns,?? principal
investigator K V Lazar, a reader with the Zoology department, told this
website's newspaper. A report on the successful completion of the first
phase has already been handed over to the DBT.

The Rs 33-lakh(747,000 USD) project aims to generate giant prawns of a
different nature from the usual fresh water prawns, combining the
technologies in genetic engineering and cloning. The growth regulating genes
in the prawns could be replaced through cloning leading to a new variety of
prawns with extra-ordinary growth rate, Lazar said.

With another one-and-a-half years left for the completion of the project, he
expects prompt introduction of the clone in prawns that would help the
country to take a major leap in the export sector.

Though researches in animal cloning are being carried out in a few
institutions across the country, a research in transgenic cloning (which
changes the genetic structure of the animal) is very rare.

??And this particular study on prawns is first in the country,?? Lazar said.

The research team has former Zoology department head U V K Muhammad and the
head of School of Environmental Science at CUSAT I S Bright Singh as the
co-investigators and Mashhoor Kattali and V Smitha as research fellows.

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