Can raccoons be domesticated?

While the scientific community is agog about the possibility of domesticating raccoons, it's reported that the animals were being sold at a pet market in Shanghai last year.

Large groups of raccoons live in many major settlements in North America and have adapted to life in the city surprisingly well. Unlike cats, they are not fussy eaters and their skill at rummaging through garbage cans is becoming the stuff of legend.

Hu Yaowu, a professor at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, said domestication is possible in theory but will take a long time. The process took hundreds, if not thousands, of years for dogs and cats. In addition, under Chinese law it is illegal to raise a raccoon at home.