Researchers on the College of Idaho have discovered a singular, non-invasive option to establish polar bears within the Arctic by scraping DNA from a bear’s paw print.

Within the face of diminishing Arctic sea ice—the place polar bears spend most of their time—scientists have been in search of methods to observe the bears with out buzzing them with helicopters, darting and dealing with them to collect information together with DNA.

In a current article, “Dedication of polar bear (Ursus maritimus) particular person genotype and intercourse primarily based on DNA extracted from paw-prints in snow” printed in Frontiers in Conservation Science, U of I researcher Jennifer Adams and Professor Lisette Waits and three co-authors from North Slope Borough Division of Wildlife and Alaska Division of Fish and Sport present how scientists can establish particular person polar bears by the stuff left of their tracks.

The “stuff” is polar bear DNA from epidermal cells bears go away behind of their tracks.

In Alaska, the researchers used trowels to scrape a skinny layer of snow from recent bear footprints. Then, in her Moscow, Idaho, genetics lab, Adams and her colleagues collected cells from the melted snow that made up the sampled polar bear tracks. The cells present a DNA fingerprint of particular person bears.

Of 15 samples collected, two have been detrimental management samples, two contained no bear DNA, and 11 have been constructive for bear DNA. The method remains to be at an experimental stage however, to date, has confirmed a non-invasive and cost-effective option to study bears within the wild.

As a result of polar bears occupy distant and environmentally excessive habitats, inhabitants monitoring for conservation and administration is difficult, pricey and changing into harder with quickly altering environmental situations.

“To our data, that is the primary time that polar bears, or another species, have been individually recognized and sexed utilizing environmental DNA collected from snow,” Adams stated.