Cheetah Genetic Anomaly Question?

Question

Cheetahs are unique because they combine physical traits of two distinctly different animal families: dogs and cats. They belong to the family of cats, but they look like long-legged dogs. They sit and hunt like dogs. They can only partially retract their claws, like dogs instead of cats. Their paws are thick and hard like dogs. They contract diseases that only dogs suffer from. The light-colored fur on their body is like the fur of a shorthaired dog. However, to climb trees they use the first claw on their front paws in the same way that cats do. In addition to their dog only diseases, they also get cat only ones. And the black spots on their bodies are, inexplicably, the texture of cat’s fur.

Genetic tests have been done on them and the surprising result was that in the 50 specimens tested, they were all, every one genetically identical with all the others.

Does anybody have any ideas which would explain cheetahs' genetic uniformity?

That answer would make sense if all cheetahs were not exactly identical genitically. They are so perfectly similar that cheetahs could all share organs without rejection. This same feat is only accomplished by cloaned lab rats. So in order for that answer to be correct there would still have to be minor genetic variation in the offspring, even if the population reached only two animals. So aside from the bottleneck theory, which you described, what could be the cause of this?

Answer 1

Closely related species of anything can almost always share organs without rejection.
I'm sure the royal family in England would have no problem swapping out organs among members of their family - and for the most part organ rejection is a reaction of the body's immune system recognizing the tissue as foreign or not (blood type plays a role in this, too).
The most plausible explanation for the genetic "similarity" (They are not IDENTICAL genetically, so unless you provide a source that states just that your argument is moot) is the bottleneck.

Answer 2

The ONLY theory I have heard from scientists is the bottleneck affect that happened long ago and killed off most of the population. However, it is unknown what caused this in the first place. There is a good book called "Tears of the Cheetah" explaining their genetics in detail, also a great article about thier genetics appeared in Scientific American about 15 years ago.

http://www.genomenewsnetwork.org/articles/2004/03/19/tears.php

Answer 3

Your first and second paragraphs, although each accurate, probably have nothing to do with each other.

Best guess about their genetic identity is that the current population of cheetahs is descended from a small group that survived some event in the past and refilled the ecological niche without needing much diversity, so little change has occurred.