Rufus R. Humphrey

[magnus_night]

Does anyone know where I can get detailed information on the experiments that Rufus R. Humphrey ( The founder of the Ambystoma Genetic Stock Center) did?
I would like to know how he got the Axolotl ( Ambystoma mexicanum ) to breed with the Tiger salamander ( Ambystoma tigrinum ).

 

[Jennewt]

Have you contacted the AGSC? Have you read the old Axolotl Newsletters? I have no info, but that's where I would start looking.

 

[Jake]

I agree with Jen. I've read a few of the axolotl newsletters and they describe his experiments in great detail.

 

[Daniel]

AGSC and the Axolotl-Newsletter are good sources.

I got the information in great detail by reading the papers published by Humphrey himself.
Some (or most?) of them are for free, you might search in databases (don't know what they are in the U.S. - maybe MedPub or JSTOR).

Alternatively try to contact libraries where you will get them for sure.

 

[John]

The paper you are looking for can be purchased at the following link for $23 (US). The reference is R. R. Humphrey, Albino Axolotls from [FONT=verdana,arial,helvetica,sans-serif][SIZE=-1][FONT=verdana,arial,helvetica,sans-serif][SIZE=-1]an[/SIZE][/FONT][/SIZE][/FONT] Albino Tiger Salamander through Hybridization, J. Hered., May 1967: 58: 95-101.

http://jhered.oxfordjournals.org/cg...ey&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT

The basic summary (I read this paper about 9 years ago so bear with me) is that they artificially fertilized ova and only some of the embryos developed significantly. None actually survived but they did take gonad tissue from the f1 hybrid embryos and transplanted this tissue to non-hybrid axolotls which could mate normally but their gametes were hybrid. Thus the homozygous recessive trait (along with the rest of the tiger salamander genome) was introduced into the axolotl.

One could hypothesise that the tiger salamander DNA has been greatly diluted by now and that the modern captive axolotl population bears little of this inheritance. I`m inclined to believe this.

 

[magnus_night]

Thank you John. That was just the info I was looking for.
Thanks to everyone else as well.