Rabbits Do Handstands Instead of Hopping Due to Faulty Gene

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By Gina Wynn

Most of us learned at a young age a basic fact about rabbits: They hop. But that’s not true for all rabbits. There’s a domesticated rabbit breed that uses another form of locomotion. Sauteur d’Alfort rabbits do handstands when they want to get somewhere quickly. Discovered by the veterinarian Etienne Lettered in 1935 at a clinic in Maisons-Alfort near Paris, the rabbits’ ironic name is French for Alfort’s jumpers.

In a recent study, an international team of researchers discovered that the rabbits’ unusual way of walking using only their front paws is caused by a genetic mutation that affects limb coordination. Their findings were published in the journal PLOS Genetics.

Not Enough Protein

The team pegged a faulty RORB gene as the culprit for causing the rabbits to send their hind legs into the air while taking off on their front paws. It alters the instructions the cells use to make proteins, which results in less of the RORB proteins in the spinal-cord nerve cells.

Called interneurons, the cells send nerve signals to the different sides of the body to help coordinate the limb movement necessary for walking and hopping. If the interneurons are lacking in RORB protein, the animal may not be able to control its hind legs enough to effectively hop.

One Foot in Front of the Other

When the rabbits move slowly, their ability to alternate their front and hind legs for walking is not affected. But when they need to hop to hurry or travel a long distance, they can’t because they don’t have the ability to quickly synchronize their hind legs, according to study coauthor Miguel Carneiro of the Universidade do Porto in Vairão, Portugal. His comments appeared in a Science News for Students article by Erin Garcia de Jesús, “These rabbits can’t hop. A gene defect makes them do handstands.”

Stephanie Koch of the University College London noticed the same handstand phenomenon in mice she had been studying with the RORB mutation. She described the mice’s gait when they throw up their back legs as similar to a duck waddle. She led a 2017 study of the mice’s abnormality that was published in Neuron.

Mastering Movement

Although not involved with the rabbit study, Koch hopes to learn more about how low levels of RORB in interneurons prompt rabbits to do handstands, according to the Science News for Students article. She thinks the RORB deficiency could be possibly affecting other aspects of the rabbits as well. Further study could also help shed light on how to cure disease caused by RORB defects, according to Koch.

The research team is taking things one step at a time, however. They hope that by gaining a better understanding of how the genetic mutation affects sauteur d’Alfort rabbits, they can enhance their knowledge of how the spinal cord works. They could also help to better explain the vital function of movement in animals and humans. 


Discussion Questions

  • Why is the spinal cord an important part of animal and human bodies? What does it do?
  • How might this research be able to help humans?

Vocabulary

  • Locomotion
  • Mutation
  • Interneurons