This is insane! The Atlas blue butterfly has 227 pairs of autosomes and four sex chromosomes, the highest recorded chromosome number in non-polyploid Metazoa!!!! See below!🦋
Charlotte WrightHow many chromosomes can an animal have? In our paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social we show that the Atlas blue butterfly has 229 chromosome pairs- the highest in diploid Metazoa! These arose by rapid autosome fragmentation while sex chromosomes stayed intact. www.cell.com/current-biol...