Zebrafish popularity is on the rise for medical research

Increasingly, medical researchers are turning to zebrafish as study subjects, rather than mice. Advantages of using zebrafish include their faster life cycles, so study effects can be seen more rapidly. They are also much smaller than mice, so huge numbers of them can be kept in relatively small spaces. But huge numbers mean that the fish need to be reproducing in large numbers, too, and zebrafish, it turns out, are a bit picky in who they choose to mate with. Biology professor Dave Parichy is among a group of experts helping uncover the traits that males and their choosier counterparts, females, prefer. Read more about the rise of zebrafish in this Wall Street Journal article.