Tetraploid fish are particularly useful in situations where it is not desirable to have rapidly breeding fish introduced into a new environment. Further, because these fish are sterile, they grow more rapidly and contain a higher amount of protein than regular diploid fish. The process involved in producing tetraploid fish is of interest to scientist in the School of Agriculture. A new technique has been developed with the Cytometry Laboratories to determine ploidy of these fish within a couple of days of hatching, eliminating the need to wait several weeks for the fish to grow to sufficient size. This project has other implications - it is also possible to distinguish many strains of fish very rapidly by their DNA content.

Associate Faculty include Professor Chris Bidwell (Animal Science).