Li Yang

Recently, the "14th Five-Year Plan" National Key R&D Program "Rescue Protection of Rare and Endangered Germplasm Resources of Major Agricultural Ruminants" project presided over by Lv Wenfa, vice president of Jilin Agricultural University and expert of the national beef cattle and yak industry technology system, has made significant progress, and 2 somatic cell cloned Yanbian cattle have been successfully bred in Bozhou, Anhui Province. This marks an important breakthrough in the protection of local cattle germplasm resources and efficient breeding technology in China, and provides an innovative sample for the protection of endangered livestock breeds.

The project team uses somatic cell cloning technology to screen high-quality embryos for transfer. Through refined pregnancy monitoring, the full-cycle health management of cloned cattle was realized for the first time: 2 cows were detected with amniotic fluid within one month, 0 were maintained after 0 days, and finally 0 were born healthy. Compared with the traditional cloning technology, the team innovated and optimized the embryo culture conditions and the perinatal care plan of the recipient cow, significantly improved the implantation rate and survival rate of cloned embryos, laid the foundation for large-scale cloning applications, and also provided materials for further research on the mechanism of cloning cattle. The results have been strongly supported by the National Domestic Animal Germplasm Resource Bank, Yazhou Bay National Laboratory, Northwest A&F University, Anhui University of Science and Technology, Yanbian Dongxing Breeding Cattle Co., Ltd. National Yanbian Cattle Breeding Farm and Xingya Farm in Qiaocheng District, Bozhou City.

Yanbian cattle is one of the five local breeds in China, known for its delicious meat quality and excellent performance, and has been included in the national list of livestock and poultry genetic resources protection, carrying rich local cultural and economic value. However, due to its low reproductive efficiency and scarcity of provenance, the traditional live seed preservation methods face challenges such as the risk of population inbreeding decline and geographical limitations. The birth of this cloned cattle means that an off-site population of Yanbian cattle can be established in Anhui, adding an innovative model of "in-situ breeding farm + off-site cloning center" to the protection system of Yanbian cattle, and providing a reference example for the protection of other local breeds.