The device, which has been used for detecting Ebola and genetically profiling tumors, is now being put toward fighting wildlife crime.

It was April 2017 in a large fish market northwest of Mumbai. Shark fins destined for China were piled onto tables, with a good dose of blood to go around. Tens of millions of sharks are killed for the fin trade every year, primarily destined to become shark fin soup, and a quarter of the world’s sharks, rays, and chimaeras (a cartilaginous fish also known as ghost sharks) are considered to be threatened. The international trade in many species is prohibited, but it can be nearly impossible for law enforcement, and even for experts like Shaili Johri, a post-doctoral biology researcher at San Diego State University, to tell whether the fins are from protected species once they’re separated from the bodies.

The samples could be sent to a lab for DNA testing, but the it was an eight-hour drive away, and the test would take a full day to process. But Johri had a futuristic trick up her sleeve—a handheld, Star Trek-like device that can say what species a part belongs to in a fraction of the time, using only a small tissue sample. The gene sequencing conducted by the MinION device, which she was testing out at the fish market, is a promising new tool to help crack down on the illegal shark fin trade.

Johri and Elizabeth Dinsdale, a biology professor at San Diego State, are coauthors of a study published recently in the journal Scientific Reports detailing the first use of the new device for wildlife conservation purposes. Announced in 2012 and launched in 2015, the roughly smartphone-sized device is made by U.K.-based Oxford Nanopore Technologies. It has been used for the detection of Ebola virus in West Africa, gene profiling of tumors, and quickly identifying the source of a salmonella outbreak, among others. It’s clear it also has the potential to help crack down on wildlife crime.

Source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2019/04/handheld-dna-device-finds-illegal-shark-fins/