Science: A rare he-she butterfly born in London's NHM

[azulai]

A rare he-she butterfly is born in London's NHM

A half-male, half-female butterfly has hatched at London's Natural History Museum.

A line down the insect's middle marks the division between its male side and its more colourful female side.

Failure of the butterfly's sex chromosomes to separate during fertilisation is behind this rare sexual chimera.

Once it has lived out its month-long life, the butterfly will join the museum's collection.

Only 0.01% of hatching butterflies are gynandromorphs; the technical term for these strange asymmetrical creatures.

...

Though rare, gynandromorphy isn't unique to butterflies; individual crabs, lobsters, spiders and chickens have all been found with a mix of two sexes.

There are likely many more cases in the natural world, but sexual chimeras are more difficult to spot in animals where females and males look alike.

[OrphanPip]

Intersex humans are born all the time too .

[Ceruleaan]

Pip is right. You should look up human androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) or complete AIS

[azulai]

I just thought it was cool about the butterfly, really. :tongue:

[princealbertofb]

Yes and a nice picture to illustrate this interesting phenomenon, as well.