(CNN)A new study may hold the key to saving the northern white rhino’s rapid descent into extinction.
The world’s last male northern white rhino died in March, bringing the subspecies dangerously closer to extinction with only two female members left worldwide and living at the Ole Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya.
With the death of the male rhino, scientists have scrambled to find ways to save the subspecies. Now a new DNA study shows northern white rhinos have mated and exchanged genes with the southern white rhinos in the past, and this would be a viable option if other methods of using pure northern white rhino genetic material fail, said Michael Bruford of Cardiff University and co-author of the study.
