Success Stories
While all our work supports fisheries, wildlife, and conservation biology, some projects are of particular interest. The stories presented here highlight projects that were the first of their kind, required innovative solutions, and involved rare and/or endangered species.
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qPCR Assay Development and eDNA Testing on the Fly
An environmental consulting company approached Pisces Molecular in early 2020 with a significant challenge for a lab of our small size: could we adapt or develop de novo eDNA assays for five aquatic species, supply sample collection materials, and test 700 samples in a period of a few weeks? The...
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Improving a Freshwater Seal qPCR Assay
In this project we modified an existing qPCR assay for Freshwater Seals, Phoca vitulina mellonae used for phylogenetic studies of populations in the Lac-des-Loups region of northern Quebec. This subspecies of Harbor Seal (Phoca vitulina) is exclusively a freshwater species, and their entire population exists...
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Greenback Cutthroat Trout in Colorado
Pisces played an important role in the discovery and reestablishment of Greenback Cutthroat trout in Colorado. The story of the Greenback is complicated and goes back over a hundred years. Greenback Cutthroat trout, the Colorado state fish, were historically found in streams and lakes of Colorado’s South Platte and Arkansas...
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Determining Paternity and Sex in Komodo Dragons
In 2019, herpetologists from the Chattanooga Zoo in Tennessee contacted Pisces with an interesting question. Their female Komodo Dragon (Varanus komodoensis), Charlie, had laid three eggs, which the zoo successfully incubated. Now they wondered if the three baby Dragons were the offspring of Charlie and Kadal, the zoo’s resident male...
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Conservation of a Critically Imperiled Fish Species in Wyoming
Most people have never heard of the unassuming hornyhead chub (Nocomis biguttatus), let alone worried about its conservation status. On the IUCN Red List, it’s a species of “Least Concern.” But to Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) biologists, entrusted with managing over 800 species...
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