Os clitoridis
The os clitoridis (also called the os clitoris or baubellum; pl.: baubella) is a bone inside the clitoris of many mammalian taxa. It is absent from the human clitoris, but present in the clitoris of some primates, such as the ring-tailed lemurs.[1] It is homologous to the baculum in male mammals.
The structure is more evolutionarily labile than the baculum, exhibiting both more inherent variability and more gains and losses over time,[2] which has been interpreted as evidence for its non-functionality.[2]
Other work posits that the variation in the os clitoridis could be driven by intersexual conflict, lock-and-key genital evolution, and cryptic female choice, especially given the high level of variation within species as well as between them.[3]
References
- ^ "A Long-Lost Bone". National Geographic Society. 3 September 2013.
- ^ a b Lough-Stevens, Michael; et al. (January 2018). "The baubellum is more developmentally and evolutionarily labile than the baculum". Ecology and Evolution. 8 (2): 1073–1083. doi:10.1002/ece3.3634. PMC 5773289. PMID 29375780.
- ^ Sloan, Nadia (September 2019). "The evolution of female genitalia". Journal of Evolutionary Biology. 32 (9): 882–899. doi:10.1111/jeb.13503. PMID 31267594.
 | This anatomy article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |