They elaborate further down the article that they suspect the shark to have xanthism in combination with albinism. The Wikipedia article even links a paper about this shark as an example of xanthism observed in sharks now

[–] pandore@lemmynsfw.com 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

It doesn't change anything to the fact genetic mutations are random and there is no specific reason for one or another to occur.

[–] sukhmel@programming.dev 1 points 2 weeks ago

Some mutations are correlated or even linked, and I think some might have specific reasons.

In this case I don't think they meant ‘scientist don't know why these mutations occurred’, so I didn't even understand your comment, it seems

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