Start with this: Japanese scientists have taken a salmon similar to this, injected it with rainbow trout sprem-producing cells…This might sound like something out of Jurassic Park, but Japanese fish researchers have successfully made the first step in artificially boosting low numbers of fish populations.

Through the use of what they call “surrogate broodstocking,” they’ve used salmon to breed rainbow trout. The process injects the sperm-growing cells of rainbow trout into newly hatched Asian masu salmon.

End up with this: a biologically correct rainbow trout that is able to reproduce. (Photos courtesy of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)If that’s not creepy or weird enough for you, check out this. The process has also worked with injecting the male cells into female salmon, who then have ovulated rainbow trout eggs. The offspring are “pure” trout and are able to reproduce offspring that genetically match the trout species.

The ultimate goal by the Japanese researchers is to replicate these efforts to be able to boost the low numbers of bluefin tuna. The research will turn to the U.S. next month in Idaho where the process will be reversed, using the plentiful trout population to be surrogates for creating the ever-increasingly rare sockeye salmon population.

What do you think? Is this tinkering too much with nature? Or is this just the technological gimmick we can use to help adjust the balance of nature our technologies of the past have thrown so far out of whack? Share your thoughts here with other Science Buzz readers.