Cats
Cat's Born With 'Divided' Face - Her Mesmerizing Photos Are Going Viral
I've never seen anything quite like this cat before!
Britanie Leclair
12.11.17

Chimera animals are one of Mother Nature’s finest creations. Split down the middle as if glued together at the seams, chimera animals always seem to draw a crowd.

Boredom Therapy
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Boredom Therapy
Boredom Therapy
Source:
Boredom Therapy

Because split-colored animals are said to be made up of DNA from two separate eggs that have merged, they are called “Chimeras”, in reference to the Chimera monster of Greek mythology who was composed of a lion’s head, a goat’s body, and a snake’s tail.

A few years back, a Chimera cat named Venus took the internet by storm with her perfectly divided body and non-matching eyes. Now, however, there’s a new Chimera cat on the block— and she is definitely giving Venus a run for her money!

Meet Quimera!

gataquimera/Instagram
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gataquimera/Instagram

Quimera is a fluffy, Chimera kitty from Argentina. And like Venus, people just can’t get enough of her adorable, divided face.

Her face and body are split into quadrants, half orange and half black, in a checkerboard-like pattern. Her right eye is a gorgeous shade of amber while the left is a piercing shade of ice blue.

gataquimera/Instagram
Source:
gataquimera/Instagram

At the time of this writing, Quimera boasts an impressive 63,000 Instagram followers, and her page is loaded with adorable pics and fun videos, all showcasing her natural and unique beauty.

But here’s where things get interesting; according to experts, Quimera and Venus are probably not chimera cats at all. In fact, according to Virginia Papaioannou, a Professor of Genetics and Development at Columbia Universal, Quimera and Venus are just regular calicos!

“This isn’t what I would call a chimera; it’s a striking example of a calico cat. It’s a fairly straightforward example of X-inactivation mosaicism, with the addition of the white spotting gene,” Papaioannou told New Republic.

Her quote was then followed by A LOT of jargon-filled genetic talk, but here is the takeaway I gathered. As mentioned, chimera cats carry DNA from two separate eggs. Calico cats (and X-inactivation mosaicism), on the other hand, only have DNA from one.

Now, try and stay with me.

Males have two sex chromosomes, an X and a Y; and females have two Xs—one from mom and one from dad. Although females have both of these X chromosomes, half of them are deactivated. A pattern like Quimera’s shows this deactivation quite nicely— the orange color comes from one parent, while the black comes from the other.

It also explains why calicos are overwhelmingly female— a male would only be able to get this coloring if, for some reason, he had an extra X chromosome.

You learn something new every day!

Regardless of the science behind her incredible coloring, this cat is absolutely stunning; be sure to follow her on Instagram for fun kitty updates and adorable pictures like this.

gataquimera/Instagram
Source:
gataquimera/Instagram

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