http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090205142137.htm

Wolf In Dog's Clothing? Black Wolves May Be First 'Genetically Modified' Predators

ScienceDaily (Feb. 5, 2009) — Slipping through trees or across snow, the wolf has glided into legend on paws of white, gray or — in North America — even black. This last group owes an unexpected debt to the cousins of the domestic dog, say Stanford researchers. In an unconventional evolutionary twist, dogs that bred with wolves thousands of years ago ceded a genetic mutation encoding dark coat color to their former ancestors. As a result, the Gray Wolf, or Canis lupus, is no longer just gray.

The effect was more than just cosmetic: the resulting black wolves, which are found nearly exclusively in North America, seem to have a selective advantage over lighter-colored wolves in forested areas. It's a rare instance of domestic animals — in this case, probably the dogs of the earliest Native Americans — contributing to the genetic variability of their wild counterparts in a way that affects both the recipients' appearance and survival.

"We usually think of domestication as something that is carried out to benefit humans," said genetics professor Greg Barsh, MD, PhD. "So we were really surprised to find that domestic animals can serve as a genetic reservoir that can benefit the natural populations from which they were derived. It's also fascinating to think that a portion of the first Native American dogs, which are now extinct, may live on in wolves." Canine geneticists generally agree that North American dogs today are all descended from European dogs.

Barsh and graduate student Tovi Anderson collaborated with, among others, scientists at the University of California-Los Angeles, the University of Calgary, the National Park Service at Yellowstone National Park and the National Human Genome Research Institute to conduct the research. Scientists from Sweden and Italy also participated in the international effort.

Anderson and her collaborators compared DNA collected from 41 black, white and gray wolves in the Canadian Arctic and 224 black and gray wolves in Yellowstone National Park with that of domestic dogs and gray and black coyotes. Their intention was to build on previous work in the Barsh lab that identified a mechanism controlling pigmentation in dogs that differs from most other mammals.

"We expected this to be a short research project to confirm that wolves and dogs shared the same genetic pathway that determines black coat color," said Anderson. "But the story got much more interesting when we expanded our research and began asking about the origin of the mutation in wolves."

Dark-coated wolves are significantly more prevalent in forested areas of the Canadian Arctic than they are in the icy tundra (62% vs. 7% of the total population, respectively). Biologists have long suspected that something about having black fur is particularly advantageous for the woodland wolves, but they weren't sure what. Because black wolves gray with age, it seems that the root cause might be deeper than just coat color.

Barsh's laboratory, which has spent years studying genes affecting coat color and other biological pathways in mammals, discovered in 2007 that the gene responsible for black fur in dogs, called beta-defensin, belongs to a family of genes previously believed to be involved in fighting infection. One version of the gene produces light or yellow-colored dogs and wolves; a mutant version missing three nucleotides produces black animals.

"Wildlife biologists don't really think that wolves rely much on camouflage to protect themselves or to increase their hunting success," said

Watch yourself in this place YR! There are lots of Wolves around here, and not all of them hunt in packs.

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Very interesting.  Thank you Abhay

It is interesting how some animals are at a colour advantage, the area where I live is full of black squirrels and black rabbits so it must have a survival advantage in Hertfordshire UK.  Apparently, in some mining areas in the North of England, the moths and sparrows are black too, where they have evolved to blend with the sooty environment.

Margaret N-J 

Thanks Abhay, this is the type of article I like to see here - something we can learn from. Got any more?