john hawks weblog

paleoanthropology, genetics and evolution

Kipunji introgression

Thu, 2009-11-12 10:30 -- John Hawks

So what's the baboon DNA doing in that rare monkey species, anyway?

The researchers are looking into whether the baboon DNA has given the kipunji any survival advantages and could possibly explain why roughly 1,000 of the monkeys live in the Southern Highlands (the population having baboon DNA) compared with just 100 in the Udzungwas.

Once again, for most primates we only know anything at all about the variation of this one genetic locus.

Tags: 
introgression
baboons
mtDNA

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