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ou may have heard about Layla, a critically endangered eastern black
Yrhinoceros at Brookfield Zoo. In late 2017, she developed a growth in her
sinus that obstructed her airway and made breathing difficult. Determined to
save her life, Zoo veterinarians and specialists used many advanced, first-of- 1
its-kind treatments. Layla became the first living adult rhinoceros to receive
computed tomography (CT) imaging, which identified the source of the
growth to be an infection caused by an impacted upper molar.
Among Layla’s treatments were surgeries to remove the tooth and infected
tissue. Planning the surgeries was difficult, said Dr. Sathya Chinnadurai, senior
vice president of Animal Health & Welfare who was involved in Layla’s care.
“Layla’s anatomy was so different because of her disease process…it would
have been helpful to have some sort of normal reference so we would know
A COLLECTIVE We wanted to know where the soft tissues of Layla’s upper airway are.”
exactly how deep to make the incision and areas where it was safe to operate.

VISION 2 In 2018, Dr. Sathya Chinnadurai,

1
Layla, eastern black rhinoceros

then senior staff veterinarian (left),
and Dr. Michael Adkesson, then
vice president of clinical medicine,
monitored Layla during a CT scan of
her head in Pachyderm; the machine
is a borrowed portable, 32-slice

2 CT scanner.

A normal reference would have been CT studies taken of the healthy
heads of living adult eastern black rhinos. A CT study consists of thousands
of images, each a micro-slice of the whole. However, these images didn’t exist
because Layla had been the first and only living adult of her species to undergo
CT imaging. This problem is not unique to rhinos. Unlike veterinarians who
VISION
treat domestic species—primarily dogs and cats—veterinarians at leading
zoological institutions work with hundreds of species. Brookfield Zoo houses
427 species of amphibians, birds, fish, reptiles, and mammals. Normal
reference images for these species are a rarity.
In 2021, seven leading zoological institutions in the United States,
including Brookfield Zoo, joined forces to address this critical need. Partner
institutions are San Diego Zoo Global, the Wildlife Conservation Society,
A COLLECTIVE
the Saint Louis Zoo, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, the Columbus Zoo and
Aquarium, and Denver Zoo. They are collaborating in the development of a
massive digital database that will hold X-ray images and CT studies of healthy
zoo and aquarium animals.

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