Genetic profile

In 2000, Ryan Johnson started taking the biopsy samples of white sharks in conjunction with Marine and Coastal Management. To date, over 150 white sharks have been sampled from various locations along South Africa's coastline.

The samples are submitted to Dr. Les R. Noble's laboratory at the University of Aberdeen, where Chryssoula Gubili is analysing the samples as part her doctoral dissertation.

The laboratory has a long tradition of white shark research, beginning with the first publication in June 2000 "Isolation and characterization of dinucleotide microsatellite loci in the great white shark, Carcharodon carcharias".

In July 2001, a breakthrough paper was published in NATURE by the lab "Sex biased dispersal of great white sharks”: dispersal of white sharks is sex-biased, with philopatric (non-roving) females and roving males.

In this paper the characteristics of movement between continents was revealed via genetic profiles.