The Wuzhishan pig is a breed of
inbredminiature pig created by Professor Feng Shutang.[1]intended to be used as a
model organism for medical research.
Physical description
A Wuzhishan pig’s length ranges from 50 to 70 cm long (19.7-27.5 inches), with adults typically weighing between 30 and 35 kilograms (66.1-77.2 pounds).[2]
Wuzhishan pigs have a distinctive two-toned body which is black dorsally and pink ventrally.
The Wuzhishan pig is mainly used to study the human
circulatory system due to the similarities between pig and human
organs.[3][2]
On May 18 2015, the
Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences announced that its Institute of Animal Science agreed to transfer all breeding research to Beijing Grand Life Science & Technology Co., Ltd.,[7] which had the sole rights to breed and sell Wuzhishan pigs for commercial purposes.
Multiple Chinese research institutions, medical schools, hospitals, and enterprises conduct research around Wuzhishan pigs to establish their suitability as research models.[8][9] Research on future
life science and medical applications of the pigs also began to take place, to which the initial results include the injection of
embryonicgerm cells into
blastocysts,[10] along with
islet isolation and purification.[11]
On June 23, 2017, the
Academy of Military Medical Sciences and Grand Life Science declared that the PERV-pol gene-deficient Wuzhishan pig had been identified and verified by systematic
virology methods and whole genome sequencing.[12] Grand Life had succeeded in reproducing F0/F1 PERV-noninfectious Wuzhishan pigs that then became available for advanced biomedical research purposes,[13] including a series of studies under the 2017-2020 National Primary Research Programs on bio-material development and tissue-organ repair.