Assisted Reproductive Techniques in Farm Animal - From Artificial Insemination to Nanobiotechnology

It has become evident that advances in farm animal reproduction have become increasingly dependent on advance scientific research in addition to an understanding of the physiological processes involved in reproduction. The use of assisted reproductive techniques (ART) has helped owners to produce offspring from valuable farm animals that were considered infertile using standard breeding techniques. This chapter constitutes an update of recent developments in the field of assisted reproduction includes Artificial insemination, Embryo transfer, in vitro fertilization, embryo cryopreservation, Sexing of semen and embryos, cloning, transgenesis, stem cell technology, embryo genomics, micro and nanotechnology has been included. Recently in some of these fields remarkable progress has been made. None the less, imperfections are remaining and sustained efforts will be required to optimize existing and invent new technologies. Before referring an animal for an ART, the practitioner should be able to identify the underlying cause of subfertility of that animal. Knowing the complexity as well as the risks of these techniques, enables practitioners to refer a sub-fertile animal to the least complex and most appropriate and successful ART that can overcome specific causes of infertility. Key Words: Reproductive Techniques, Artificial Insemination, Nanobiotechnology, Embryo Transfer, Cryopreservation, Cloning, Transgenesis, Stem Cell Technology, Embryo Genomics.