A paper on a project led by Leo Campagna and involving collaborators from the USA, Brazil, and Argentina is out today in Science Advances. This paper shows how a small number of genes that control plumage traits have been under repeated selection (probably via sexual selection) to produce the amazing variety of male plumages in this radiation where the species are otherwise nearly identical in genetics and ecology.
Leonardo Campagna, Márcio Repenning, Luís Fábio Silveira, Carla Suertegaray Fontana, Pablo L. Tubaro, Irby J. Lovette (2017). Repeated divergent selection on pigmentation genes in a rapid finch radiation, Science Advances, 3:e1602404 published online on 24 May 2017 before print | doi:10.1126/sciadv.1602404 [bioRxiv preprint]
