Prevalence of sexual dimorphism in mammalian phenotypic traits

Nat Commun. 2017 Jun 26:8:15475. doi: 10.1038/ncomms15475.

Abstract

The role of sex in biomedical studies has often been overlooked, despite evidence of sexually dimorphic effects in some biological studies. Here, we used high-throughput phenotype data from 14,250 wildtype and 40,192 mutant mice (representing 2,186 knockout lines), analysed for up to 234 traits, and found a large proportion of mammalian traits both in wildtype and mutants are influenced by sex. This result has implications for interpreting disease phenotypes in animal models and humans.

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Body Weight
  • Female
  • Genes, Modifier
  • Genotype
  • Mammals / physiology*
  • Mice
  • Phenotype
  • Quantitative Trait, Heritable*
  • Sex Characteristics*