Dental implant for first artificial turtle flipper

By Ed Stoddard

SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas (Reuters Life!) - Allison is forever going in circles.

That's because she is a green sea turtle who lost three of her flippers to a shark attack, leaving her with just her right front flipper that can only propel her to the left.

But her permanent spiral may soon end as she has been lined up to be fitted with a prosthetic flipper attached via a dental bone implant -- a turtle first. The other option would be an external strap-on device.

She was rescued in 2005 on the sub-tropical shores of South Padre Island on the Texas Gulf coast and now resides in a small tank at Sea Turtle, Inc, a research and conservation center which among other things rehabilitates injured sea turtles.

"She's going to be like a pirate with a peg leg," Adrienne McCracken, an assistant at Sea Turtle, Inc, told some wide-eyed children visiting the center as Allison made her rounds in her tank.

The implant will go where her lower left flipper once was and even if it is successful she will still not be released back into the wild as the flipper will have to be replaced periodically and enlarged as she grows.

But it will enable the 14 pound (6 kg) turtle to swim in a deeper tank without drowning.

"If it is successful she could be in deep water at an aquarium and serve as an ambassador for endangered sea turtles," said Sea Turtle, Inc curator Jeff George.