SC: Genes Responsible for Hairless Foxes

Research on those hairless foxes in the news last year has come up with an interesting finding:

"The latest research results on the weird-looking Shem Creek hairless foxes reported around the area last summer will be presented at the Southeastern Wildlife Exposition, a College of Charleston biologist said Thursday.
"Jaap Hillenius, associate professor in the biology department, said a necropsy performed on a dead hairless fox found in a neighborhood off Chuck Dawley Boulevard in Mount Pleasant showed no obvious causes for the fox's hairless condition.
"There was no mange or other skin parasites or disease, and the fox was in reasonably good nutritional condition, Hillenius said.
"'The most likely explanation thus remains that this concerns a genetic fluke, a hereditary trait that shows up in some families of foxes,' Hillenius said.
"One of his students, Amanda Jenkins, will have a poster presenting the findings today through Sunday at Marion Square. Students will be on hand to answer questions about the fox research, he said." ...
"A hairless-fox sighting has been reported in the town as recently as two weeks ago, Hillenius said." ...
"Hillenius sent genetic material from the dead fox to a colleague at the University of California at Los Angeles, who identified it as a gray fox.
"Hillenius said similar fox sightings were reported in Finland in the 1930s and 1940s. The reports declined over the next 20 years. 'We're still reading up on this, but there doesn't seem to be an obvious explanation for this decades-long population spike,' he said.
"Hillenius said more research is needed to determine whether local reports of bald foxes are on the upswing or whether they are relatively constant over time."