Nature Communications (Apr 2019)

Genetics and evidence for balancing selection of a sex-linked colour polymorphism in a songbird

  • Kang-Wook Kim,
  • Benjamin C. Jackson,
  • Hanyuan Zhang,
  • David P. L. Toews,
  • Scott A. Taylor,
  • Emma I. Greig,
  • Irby J. Lovette,
  • Mengning M. Liu,
  • Angus Davison,
  • Simon C. Griffith,
  • Kai Zeng,
  • Terry Burke

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-09806-6
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 1
pp. 1 – 11

Abstract

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Gouldian finches have a head colour polymorphism that is also associated with physiological and behavioural differentiation. Here, the authors map this colour polymorphism to a putative regulatory region for follistatin on the Z chromosome and suggest it is maintained by balancing selection.