Plz
Science side of tumblr please help
So, while i was depressed with the state of everything and my own incompetency I came up with idea. Yah know how Chinese and eastern Asian traditional medicine is single handedly taking down the largest animal species or useless body parts? (cuz if not please go read sum stuff and come back its an issue that should be known more at least if not addressed more).
This goes from tiger body parts being used as charms, to Shark fin being notably the height of luxury wedding soups as well as sold as a cancer cure, to the obvious ivory trade because people just think its neat, to both the horn of rhinos and the scale of a pangolin, both the same keratin substances in nails and hair, being worth way more than its weight in gold. The poaching (and finning) industries have become so profitable that they end up controlling entire governments, with shark fining so lucrative that it was once secretly backed by the Costa Rica and Ecuador, fishing allowed in the migratory shark hotspot that is the Galapagos in 2007.
Conservation around poached species is arguably the most difficult issues in the field, with the demand and price the product going up with each kill, every second. One approach to this is to remove the valuable part from the animal, making it worthless. They dye rhino horns pink, making it valued so much les its not targeted (usual). So, my question is, instead of destroying the supply and increasing the demand, why cant we do the opposite.
Can we grow Rhino horns, pangolin scales, maybe even ivory and shark fins, in a lab with stem cells?
Before I get laughed out of the room, understand that I know nothing about stem cells besides that they can grow tissue outside of a body, and that they are a huge part of medical research with organ replacement. I also know that it, being a relatively new and unknown field of research, that it is REALY expensive. But as the technology and knowledge on it progresses, can we maybe get to a point where it is easier for poachers to get an artificially grown horn from a lab than a month long campaign across 4-8 different nations with military helicopters and machine guns to find one bull with 7 pounds for horn, then chainsaw its head and transport to China? Could we set up a lab that would grow all this, but make it distinct enough that the buyer wont find out its not fresh poached? (they would one hundred percent do this, we are talking about selling hundreds of pounds of matted hair and nail clipping for more than most of us will ever make)
sorry so long someone plz respond. Please show this to anyone who knows about stem cell research/ growing new organs.
