A golden clue to human skin colour variation

✍ Scribed by Jeanette Müller; Robert N. Kelsh

• Book ID: 101708871
• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2006
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 127 KB
• Volume: 28
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0265-9247
• DOI: 10.1002/bies.20409

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Variations in human skin pigmentation are obvious, but how have skin colour differences evolved? Although clearly a polymorphic trait, the number and identity of key variants has remained unclear. Investigation of pigmentation phenotypes in model organisms provides a route to identify these genes and showed MC1R to be one key locus. Now, cloning of a classic zebrafish mutant, golden, identifies slc24a5 as a gene involved in fish skin pigmentation.1 Strikingly this study identifies the human orthologue, SLC24A5, as likely to make a major contribution to the pale skin colouration of Western Europeans. BioEssays 28: 578–582, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.