Identifying Snow Leopards, Tigers and other Endangered Species by developing a low-cost DNA field test kit - Part 2

By Natalie Schmitt
Backed by Lawrence Curtis, Tony Blanche, Sinclair Flint, Brett Parris, Cath Deacon, Carolyn Ching, Nat Kelly, Brad Schmitt, Carlos Olavarria, Rhonda Pike, and 34 other backers
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Australia
BiologyEcology
DOI: 10.18258/9670
$6,100
Raised of $4,400 Goal
138%
Funded on 8/29/17
Successfully Funded
  • $6,100
    pledged
  • 138%
    funded
  • Funded
    on 8/29/17
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Discussion

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  • Carlos Olavarria
    Carlos OlavarriaBacker
    So great to see you got the support you needed. Hope things are good with you my friend. Love, Carlos
    Aug 14, 2017
  • Natalie Schmitt
    Natalie SchmittResearcher
    Dear Carlitos, this is just so generous of you my friend.....I really couldn't continue with this without the support of good friends like you. Thank you so so much xx
    Aug 14, 2017
  • Chrissy Biela
    Chrissy BielaBacker
    Keep up the great work!
    Aug 09, 2017
  • Natalie Schmitt
    Natalie SchmittResearcher
    Dear Chrissy...thank you so much for this, I'm so grateful you think the project is worth supporting :)
    Aug 10, 2017
  • Anand Shah
    Anand ShahBacker
    Apologies if this is a silly question, but will the test kit be able to differentiate between different snow leopards in an area or only between different species (say between a snow leopard and a mountain goat for example)? Looks like a very promising technology, which I would like to support. You're doing great work! Thank you.
    Jul 31, 2017
  • Natalie Schmitt
    Natalie SchmittResearcher
    Not a silly question at all thanks for the interest. At this stage we can only differentiate between species as there are so few genetic differences between snow leopards and their closest relatives. But for some species there may be enough sequence differences to distinguish between populations :) I think it's a great question! Thanks!
    Jul 31, 2017
  • Anand Shah
    Anand ShahBacker
    Thank you for your reply! I volunteered in tiger census in India a few years ago. We were looking for tiger scats as well as that of it's prey. I wondered back then how we could ensure we were not counting the same individual animal twice (or more) to estimate it's population. Would your kit help some way to reduce the guess work and improve the accuracy? Thank you again.
    Aug 01, 2017
  • Natalie Schmitt
    Natalie SchmittResearcher
    Wow Anand that's wonderful. Unfortunately the kit won't have the sensitivity to distinguish between individual tigers...you would need to take the sample which my kit could identify as tiger, back to the lab and run a micro satellite analysis for that. However, once I've developed the method for species identification, the next step would be to distinguish between populations and then individuals. My method is inexpensive and highly portable so won't do what the expensive sequencing machines will do :)
    Aug 01, 2017
  • Rhonda Pike
    Rhonda PikeBacker
    Supporting you because you're a frickin legend doing an amazing job. And because one day you might be my daughter's supervisor.
    Jul 31, 2017
  • Natalie Schmitt
    Natalie SchmittResearcher
    Rhonda I'm speechless...thank you! Your generosity and constant support means the absolute world to me...and if I get to the stage where I can actually earn some money...I'll gladly give your little girl a job :)
    Jul 31, 2017