Thousands of years ago, for reasons still unknown, nearly the entire population of cheetahs died off, leaving the remaining population with little genetic diversity, known as a genetic bottleneck. Somehow cheetahs were able to overcome this obstacle and establish populations in Africa, Asia, and Europe, but habitat destruction and human exploitation have wiped out the Asian and European populations completely, and now the limited area that cheetahs occupy in Africa is being destroyed, threatening the cheetahs for a second time with extinction. The only hope left for cheetahs is that they can be bred in captivity. Unfortunately, the captive population in zoos is just barely self-sustaining, and breeding is sporadic. Yes, it's true that cheetahs suffer from a lack of genetic variation, but the main culprit of unsuccessful breeding in captivity is now thought to be a lack of understanding of the animal's behavior.
Cheetahs are very different socially from every other cat.
What distinguishes them from all others is that male cheetahs will form lifelong coalitions of two to four members. Usually the coalition is made up of brothers, but sometimes non-related males live together as well. Zookeepers have historically housed cheetahs the same way that other big cats are housed, but as more studies of wild cheetahs are conducted, the more they realize that maybe what's right for the lions or tigers is not right for the cheetahs. The four male cheetahs living at the National Zoo live in permanent coalitions. Working along with my mentor, Dr. Carlos Ruiz-Miranda, and the Management and Program Coordinator of the Cheetah Conservation Station, Stuart A. Wells, a project was developed with three specific goals.