Zoo InternQuest is a career exploration program for high school students. For more information see the Zoo InternQuest Journals. For more photos see the Zoo InternQuest Photo Journal.

Animal reproduction is incredibly important when it comes to increasing the population of an endangered species. It is no wonder then that the Zoological Society of San Diego goes to great efforts to know exactly when the endangered animals under their care are ready to reproduce. This is where the scientists of the Reproductive Physiology division come into the picture.

Dr. Chris Tubbs brought us into the endocrinology lab where he wasted no time in explaining how to study hormone levels of a particular animal by examining various samples from the animal. Hormones can be extracted from everything from animal blood to even urine and feces. Dr. Tubbs introduced to us one of the investigative procedures he uses on a regular basis: the enzyme immuno assay, or EIA. An EIA can be used to quantify the amount of progesterone, a particular hormone found in female animals, present in a sample. Depending upon the assay results, Dr. Tubbs is able to tell whether the animal is going through her normal reproductive cycles, if she is pregnant, or if something might be causing her to be non-reproductive, in which case further investigation is warranted.

Dr. Tubbs even prepared some mock assays for us to experiment with! These artificial assays gave us a good example of how involved the process really is. Once all of our samples had been mixed and the reactions had taken place, we compared our samples with several control mixtures to determine how much progesterone was in our samples based on color changes. It was difficult, but we managed to get through it just fine. After graphing our results, Dr. Tubbs helped us interpret the data to establish the reproductive status of our study animal. While our mock assays were a simplified version of Dr. Tubbs does, they gave us a clear picture of the importance of his work and that of his fellow scientists as well as the collective efforts of the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park in helping endangered species.

Stephen, Careers Team

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