With on average one pangolin poached from the wild every five minutes, this scaly anteater is the most highly trafficked animal in the world. Despite an international trade ban and millions of dollars of education campaigns, the killing of the pangolin for food and medicines continues unabated. In particular, the use of its scales in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a large driver of demand.

Working with Conservation X Labs, a D.C-based company that specializes in conservation technology, our team sought to explore a new approach for pangolin conservation––manufacturing synthetic pangolin scales as a substitute for the wild product.

The idea isn’t new within the conservation community. In 2012, Rhinoceros Horn LLC launched a crowdfunding campaign for synthetic rhino horns. The company ultimately folded, but the project has since been undertaken by Pembient, a Seattle-based startup that aims to flood the carving market with cheap synthetics, pricing out poachers. Pembient is preparing to launch their product by 2022.

In TCM, pangolin scales are used to clear “blockages” in the body, such as to promote lactation and reduce swelling. TCM consumers often attribute this effect to the burrowing behavior of the animal.

To closely simulate the physical and chemical properties of the scales, Dr. Mark Van Dyke, associate professor of bioengineering at Virginia Tech, proposes that we extract keratin, the primary component of the scales, from other readily available sources.

“We are not making a recombinant keratin product from scratch,” said Dr. Van Dyke. By using existing keratin from sources such as cow horn, a synthetic scale would contain the same primary component while being more sustainable and higher quality than pangolin scales on the black market, which undergo zero quality control.

To research the viability of a synthetic pangolin scale, our team interviewed more than 50 individuals spanning the TCM and conservation communities.

Perspectives from the TCM Community

Although China is technically compliant with CITES, which banned the global trade of pangolin in 2016, designated TCM hospitals in China are allowed to source scales from a legal stockpile that dates back to the 1960s. Since the ban, the Chinese government has not released data on the stockpile. However, estimates indicate that consumption levels should have depleted the original stock. Poor regulation means illegal scales are still easily attainable—even licensed wholesalers regularly mix trafficked scales with legal ones.

“Doctors don’t know what is legal or illegal because [pangolin] is widely available in the markets,” said Yifu Wang, a PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge who has surveyed TCM doctors.

Wang noted that doctors tend to undervalue pangolin as a species. “Many have never known the [pangolin] as an animal, only as a product,“ Wang said. As such, doctors care little about pangolin welfare.

The medical efficacy of pangolin scales is controversial. But for TCM consumers, scientific proof pertains mainly to Western medicine. TCM is understood as a separate entity, a practice legitimized by its two-thousand-year history and driven by the faith of its patients.

The nature of TCM also makes it very difficult to test in modern clinical trials. TCM formulations are often a combination of different medical ingredients, with active compounds interacting in ways that are difficult to measure or replicate.

The importance of each active compound also explains why bears continue to be exploited for their bile in TCM, despite the existence of the synthetic compound, UDCA, on the market for decades. UDCA (Ursodeoxycholic acid) has been identified as the primary acid in bear bile and has been shown to have medical benefits. However, TCM practitioners maintain that a synthetic with only a single active compound is not a perfect substitute.

“If you isolate individual active compounds from Chinese medicines, the majority of chemicals in TCM are common by chemical structures,” said Dr. Jianhui Rong, associate professor at the School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong University. “The concentration and potency of these common compounds may not be strong enough to elicit pharmacological effects. However, when several TCM ingredients are used in combination, different active compounds may coordinate with each other against various diseases.”

A few TCM practitioners we spoke to are open to a synthetic pangolin substitute, provided they contain the active compounds found within pangolin scales. However, this is easier said than done. The complete chemical makeup of pangolin scales is unknown—keratin might be only one of many compounds. A government sponsored project for a prominent Chinese pharmacy to create synthetic bear bile with all active compounds ultimately fell through as costs ran too high, especially compared to farmed substitutes derived from captive breeding programs.

Other TCM practitioners question the necessity of a synthetic substitute, given that herbal alternatives are readily available and listed in the Pharmacopeia, the official TCM handbook. Still others maintain that pangolin scales cannot be substituted with equal effectiveness.

From the consumer standpoint, consumer surveys have consistently shown a preference for the wild product over a farmed substitute, and the farmed substitute over a synthetic. Surveys also suggest that substitutes and the wild product would occupy separate markets, with certain consumer segments seeking the wild product as long as it is available.

Perspectives from the Conservation Community

Wildlife conservation organizations are wary of synthetic substitutes. If a substitute is not seen as a perfect replacement, they argue, consumers will continue to demand the wild product. A legal trade would also remove the stigma associated with an illegal product, making it more likely for law-abiding citizens to begin participation in the market and increasing demand. This is referred to as the “stigma effect” and has been observed in the ivory and bear bile markets.

For a synthetic substitute to work, it must be “100 percent distinguishable [from the wild product], easy for enforcement officers to see, and impossible for corrupt traders to get around,” said Elizabeth Bennett, Vice President of Species Conservation at the Wildlife Conservation Society. Otherwise, an indistinguishable product would allow the wild product to be laundered  through the open market.

The Chinese government is launching a controversial captive breeding program, despite concerns that farmed substitutes would stimulate demand. Several pangolin farms are already operating, but their success remains to be seen—pangolin are notoriously difficult to raise in captivity. China’s investment in captive breeding means they are unlikely to allocate resources to a synthetic substitute.

Our findings indicate that at this point, conservation success for a synthetic pangolin scale is unlikely. However, pangolin conservationists have reason to remain optimistic. The Chinese government recently removed pangolin medicines from state insurance coverage and is considering upgrading the species to Class 1 status, China’s highest level of wildlife protection. TCM hospitals will reportedly still be allowed to prescribe pangolin, but experts say the changes would help enormously with consumer awareness and demand.