They looked at 120 individuals, drawing from all of the known species ... ALX1 gene distinguished between birds that use a blunt, stout beak to crack open tough seed casings, and other birds ...

pointed beak and feeds on medium-sized seeds and cactus pollen; and the large ground finch (<i>Geospiza magnirostris</i>) that has a large, blunt beak and feeds on large seeds. Variation in beak ...

The ancestor of the finches probably had a pointy beak, but some of the species developed blunt beaks better for crushing seeds. In the new analysis, the researchers found that blunt beaks are ...

By comparing the pointed-beak species and blunt-beak species, the researchers have found that the differences in the gene dubbed ALX1 were linked not only with the differences in the beak between ...