Is your cat’s birthplace in their DNA?

PUBLISHED ON January 14, 2025 by Claire Hendershot

A cat owner cradles a fuzzy orange cat in their lap with white bedding in the background.

Where in the world is your cat from? Their birthplace may hold clues to their genetic makeup.

 

When you create an account with Darwin’s Cats, we ask you all the standard questions about your feline friend—name, age, sex. But one question may come as a surprise: Where was your cat born?

It may seem like a random detail, especially if you adopted your cat from a shelter and don’t know their birthplace. But it’s important to ask because our scientists think that, like humans, cats’ DNA could vary based on their birthplace. In fact, your cat’s birthplace could reveal more about their genetic history than their breed can, which is surprising considering the critical role breed plays in the genetics of other domesticated animals, like dogs.

Dogs were domesticated from wolves tens of thousands of years ago, and in some parts of the world, humans started selectively breeding dogs for jobs like herding, hunting, or guarding. Generations of selective breeding have created more than 400 recognized modern dog breeds.

Cats, on the other hand, weren’t subjected to the same level of matchmaking. While dogs were bred to help perform specific tasks, cats weren’t bred much at all. “For the most part, humans have not genetically controlled cats,” explained Michelle White, a veterinarian scientist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. “Most cats in pet populations have a very mixed genetic background.”

Modern cat breeding is a relatively recent practice that mainly selects for desirable aesthetic features—like particular coat colors or patterns—rather than functionality. Compared to the hundreds of distinct dog breeds, there are only about 40-50 recognized cat breeds, most of which have emerged within the last 75 years. On an evolutionary timescale, that’s a blink of an eye compared to the thousands of years that cats have lived with humans.

It’s estimated that cats began living alongside humans more than 10,000 years ago, hunting the rats and vermin that gathered around food stores in human settlements. Cats were already pretty good at their self-appointed jobs of vermin control, and humans saw no need to intervene. Thus began a symbiotic relationship between humans and cats: cats keep the vermin in check, and humans keep the cats fed. 

Because cats lived alongside humans for so long, some scientists think that cats’ genetic diversity—the range of biological variation within a population—may be similar to that of humans. Just as genetic patterns vary across human populations from different geographic locations, cats’ traits—and the genes that influence them—can vary depending on where their ancestors roamed. Mountains, oceans, and other geographic or ecological boundaries separate different populations, leading to genetic differences over time. The greater the geographic distance between populations, the greater the genetic differences.

Of course, populations don’t always stay in the same region forever. Little is known about cat history, but historians and archaeologists hypothesize that as humans spread across the globe, they likely brought their feline friends along for the ride. By telling Darwin’s Cats where your cat was born, you can help our scientists understand how cats from different parts of the world are connected to each other, and start to piece together their demographic history. “Right now, we have hints that the population structure of cats in the U.S. is driven by geography, where cats from the same region are genetically more similar to each other, and cats from different regions are more distant,” said Kasia Bryc, Director of Research & Scientific Engagement at Darwin’s Ark. “We’d love to discover if that’s the case, and for that we need to study the birthplaces of lots of cats. Even approximate locations or guesses will help!”

Unlike most domesticated mammals, cats have few major genetic changes from their wild counterparts. This makes cat birthplaces even more important to study, since scientists can begin to uncover how domestic cats may have intermixed with wildcats living in the same regions, shedding light on the flow of genes between these populations over time. 

Ultimately, your cat’s birthplace is more than just a fun fact—it’s a portal into their genetic history. By mapping the geographic spread of cats, scientists hope to piece together the puzzle of where cats came from, their interactions with human and wildcat populations, and why certain traits are more common in specific populations. Much like how learning about your own ancestry can shed light on familial connections and traits, discovering where your cat’s ancestors roamed will likely reveal fascinating insights into their genetic makeup. 

As of January 2025, more than 2500 cats are participating in Darwin’s Cats. Here is a map of their birthplaces:

World map with green dots representing the birthplaces of cats signed up for Darwin's Cats' community science research project.

So, where was your cat born? Even your best guess will help our scientists explore the relationship between geography and genetics. And, if you’d like to play a bigger role in understanding cat genetics, consider sequencing your cat’s DNA with Darwin’s Cats. Our scientists need birthplaces and DNA sequences from thousands of cats to assemble the fascinating puzzle of cats’ genetic history.

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