Pierre Comizzoli has worked as a Doctor in Veterinary Medicine in French Guyana to study the seasonal reproduction of different mammalian species living in the rain forest. He also has been in charge of reproductive and health monitoring programs (sheep, goat and cattle) in the African Sahelo-Saharan region. Dr. Comizzoli then obtained a Master and a Ph.D. on reproductive biotechnologies in bovine and deer species. He described an original effect of the paternal component on early embryo development in both species. After his Ph.D., he has worked on the implementation of assisted reproductive techniques and genome resource banking at the National Museum of Natural History of Paris. In 2002, Dr. Comizzoli joined the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in Washington DC as a staff scientist to develop new projects on gamete and gonadal tissue cryo-banking for rare and endangered species. Dr. Comizzoli now is coordinating a Smithsonian-wide initiative to improve the management and use of biomaterial and environmental repositories within the Institution. He also is in charge of conservation projects on wild carnivores and ungulates in Northern Africa (Chair of the Scientific Committee of the Sahara Conservation Fund) as well as in South-East Asia (Member of the IUCN/SSC Saola Working Group).