The baubellum is more developmentally and evolutionarily labile than the baculum.

ABSTRACT: Understanding the evolutionary forces that influence sexual dimorphism is a fundamental goal in biology. Here, we focus on one particularly extreme example of sexual dimorphism. Many mammal species possess a bone in their penis called a baculum. The female equivalent of this bone is called the baubellum and occurs in the clitoris, which is developmentally homologous to the male penis. To understand the potential linkage between these two structures, we scored baculum/baubellum presence/absence across 163 species and analyzed their distribution in a phylogenetic framework. The majority of species (N = 134) shared the same state in males and females (both baculum and baubellum present or absent). However, the baubellum has experienced significantly more transitions, and more recent tr

SUBMITTER: Lough-Stevens M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5773289 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature