Jungle Genes: First bird genome is decoded

An international research team this week unveiled a draft of the first bird genome to be sequenced. It comes from a vintage chicken.

WILD BIRD. The newly sequenced genome of the red junglefowl (a female is shown here), the ancestral chicken from Southeast Asia, offers scientific opportunities. © Doug Wechsler/VIREO

The red junglefowl, native to Southeast Asia, belongs to the same species as the world’s domesticated chicken flocks, explains Richard Wilson of Washington University School of Medicine in St.