Research overview: mutation rate and genetic novelty in cats

The rate at which new mutations arise sets the pace of evolution and the recovery of diversity in small populations, yet it has been difficult to measure directly in cats. This overview surveys efforts to estimate the feline mutation rate from pedigrees and comparative genomics, the role of de novo mutations in generating coat-color and disease variants observed by breeders, and the implications of mutation rate for how quickly bottlenecked populations can regenerate lost variation. It discusses how spontaneous mutations underlie many of the striking phenotypes studied in domestic cats and how mutation rate factors into models of genetic recovery for endangered felids.