{"id":134969,"date":"2021-09-17T17:50:41","date_gmt":"2021-09-17T12:20:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=134969"},"modified":"2021-09-20T11:31:27","modified_gmt":"2021-09-20T06:01:27","slug":"scientists-unravel-mystery-behind-odishas-black-tigers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/scientists-unravel-mystery-behind-odishas-black-tigers\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientists unravel mystery behind Odisha\u2019s \u2018black tigers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is the\u00a0news?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Recently, scientists have resolved the mystery behind the \u2018black tigers\u2019 of\u00a0Simlipal\u00a0in Odisha.\u00a0A recent study has discovered that the coat\u00a0colouration\u00a0and patterning that make the wild cats appear dark boil down to a single mutation in the\u00a0<\/span>Transmembrane Aminopeptidase Q (Taqpep) gene<\/span><\/b>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The researchers found that the Similipal black tigers may have arisen from a very small founding population of tigers and are inbred, providing an answer to the question that had perplexed so many.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The abnormally dark or black coat in such tigers is termed\u00a0pseudomelanistic\u00a0or false\u00a0coloured.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What\u00a0are\u00a0the\u00a0findings of the\u00a0study?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

First,<\/span><\/b>\u00a0tigers in the\u00a0Simlipal\u00a0Tiger Reserve are an isolated population in eastern India, and gene flow between them and other tiger populations is very restricted.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Second,\u00a0<\/span><\/b>such\u00a0<\/span>isolated and inbred populations of tigers are prone to extinction over even short periods of time.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Third,\u00a0<\/span><\/b>the researchers found out that\u00a0pseudomelanistic\u00a0coat came down to the genes. It was found that\u00a0<\/span>black tigers are mutants and are Bengal tigers with a single base mutation.\u00a0Different mutations in this gene are known to cause similar changes in coat\u00a0<\/span>colour\u00a0in several other species of cats, including cheetahs. T<\/span>he drastic change in patterning and\u00a0colouring\u00a0of the black tigers\u2019 coat is caused by just one change in the genetic material DNA Alphabet from C (Cytosine) to T (Thymine) in position 1360 of the\u00a0Taqpep\u00a0gene sequence.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Fourthly,\u00a0<\/span><\/b>Genetic analyses and comparisons with a total of 395 captive and wild Indian tiger populations indicates that the mutation in\u00a0Similipal\u00a0tigers is very rare.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Fifthly<\/span><\/b>,\u00a0the\u00a0only other black tigers outside of\u00a0Similipal\u00a0in India exist at the\u00a0Nandankanan\u00a0Zoological Park in Bhubaneswar, Ranchi Zoo and Chennai\u2019s\u00a0Arignar\u00a0Anna Zoological Park, where they were born in captivity. These captive-born tigers shared a common ancestry with\u00a0Similipal\u00a0tigers.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Sixthly,\u00a0<\/span><\/b>t<\/span>he researchers also carried out investigations to understand why this mutation occurred at such a high frequency in\u00a0Similipal\u00a0alone.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

One hypothesis<\/span><\/b>\u00a0is that the darker coat\u00a0colour\u00a0of the mutants offers them a selective advantage when hunting in the dense closed-canopy and relatively darker forested areas of\u00a0Similipal\u00a0as compared to the open plains of most other tiger habitats.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Other reason<\/span><\/b>\u00a0might be the\u00a0small founding population and prolonged isolation from other tiger populations in India.\u00a0Due to this geographic isolation, genetically related individuals have been mating with each other for many generations in\u00a0Similipal, leading to inbreeding.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/span><\/b>: This post is based on the article “<\/span>Scientists unravel mystery behind Odisha\u2019s \u2018black tigers<\/span><\/b>” published in the\u00a0<\/span>Indian Express<\/span><\/b>\u00a0on\u00a0<\/span>14th September 2021.<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is the\u00a0news?\u00a0 Recently, scientists have resolved the mystery behind the \u2018black tigers\u2019 of\u00a0Simlipal\u00a0in Odisha.\u00a0A recent study has discovered that the coat\u00a0colouration\u00a0and patterning that make the wild cats appear dark boil down to a single mutation in the\u00a0Transmembrane Aminopeptidase Q (Taqpep) gene.\u00a0 The researchers found that the Similipal black tigers may have arisen from a… Continue reading Scientists unravel mystery behind Odisha\u2019s \u2018black tigers<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10328,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1566,4182,9],"tags":[1355,8927,9818],"class_list":["post-134969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-factly-articles","category-environment","category-public","tag-biodiversity","tag-biodiversity-conservation","tag-black-tiger","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":1700790324,"cached_date":1704861741},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10328"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134969\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}