Methods of Embryo Sexing in Cattle Breeding: A Review

Different livestock sectors as beef industries get benefit from the production of male animals while dairy industries get benefit from the milk production by the female animals. Therefore, it is obvious need to produce the animals of desired sex which can be achieved by predetermining the sex of conceptus at the time of conception i.e. pre determination of sex may be of great economic importance. Control of the sex ratio by sex prediction of the of pre implanted embryo would be beneficial not only in relation to the aspect of management, production and breeding programmes of livestock but also in diagnosing the genetic disorders at prenatal stage. Preimplantation sexing of embryos not only improves efficiency of embryo transfer but also facilitate the transfer of embryos of desired sex. Sexsorted sperm is a one of the technique fulfilling the requirement but it is well expensive and less efficient. Another concept of getting genetically improved animals of desired sex is embryo sexing. Embryo sexing has great potential to maximize the efficiency of dairy production through controlling the sex ratio of domestic species. There are many methods to determine the sex of embryo categorized as invasive and noninvasive techniques with varying efficiency and merits.