Today Dot, Jerry Underfoot & I, CEO Olivia want to share with you a wooftastic project that invites your humans to pawticipate as scientific pawtners.   Their projects, combine genetics & behavior to advance the understanding of complex diseases.  They are a non-profit that subscribes to the open science model; meaning they do not own & never will sell your furleggers data.  You contribute to an open source database & all the new findings will be shared freely with you & researchers around the world in the hopes of advancing health care for us furleggers & our humans.

We are yapping about Darwin’s Ark Project who’s goal is to better understand the genetic influences on how us dogs look & behave. They ask questions about our behavior & about the genes controlling all sorts of our canine traits, from size to coat color to shyness to interest in play. Their hope is as this long term research progresses, their findings will help us to better understand how genetics affect our pawsonality, health & sensitivities. To do this study, they need a massive number of dogs, and they are asking for our help.

How can we help you may be asking yourself.  We can help by pawticiipating in answering survey questions which they will use in their research, studying differences in behaviour between breeds.   If you are interested in paying for the sequencing of your dog’s DNA, you can additionally request a DNA kit so that you can send in a saliva sample. They’ll sequence the DNA from the saliva & send you genetic & ancestry information about your furlegger. That information will also be added to their pawtastic data bank of information, to be shared freely throughout the scientific world.  

There are a variety of projects to pawticipate in such as the Dog Project, The Tick Research Project, an upcoming Cat Project (you can sign up now) & their newest project, The Darwin Ark Cancer Project.

The data collected from their surveys are a crucial part of their research, & show us a wooftastic aspect of us dogs not seen through the microscope. They use our survey data to answer questions such as “are Labrador retrievers really more interested in food than other breeds?” & “are anxious dogs more likely to have allergies?” &  “what kinds of personality traits tend to go together?” These questions are scientifically interesting on their own, but also help them develop theories about what’s going on at the genetic level.  In regards to the Cancer Project our survey data will help in understanding why dogs get cancer & the best ways to help us. They plan to study risk factors passed down from pawrents to puppies, test methods to detect cancer in a blood sample, & compare exposures to potential cancer risk factors in each dog’s home & surrounding areas.

You can help by signing up your pawsome dog,  tell all your pawtastic  furiends & furmily! Answer their survey questions about your dog. That pawvides them with wagnificently helpful data. If you are in the pawsition to, they are always seeking donations to help them analyze more DNA.

Remember, if you have a question we love to pawvide you with answers.  Reach out to us here, through Instagram, Facebook, email or call us.  If you don’t have long distance calling contact us online & let us call you.

Have a pawsome week, CEO Olivia, Dot & Jerry Underfoot 💜

PS 🐾 Looking for wagnifient healthy & furbulously fun toys or pawsibly a supplement for the well being of your pawtacular good dog or cat? Shop Naturally

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