Sukie has (ir)regularly posted about deafness and some medical issues
being the result of neural crest variations (I hope that terminology
is right). A lot of what she's said didn't make sense to me (not her
fault, I'm just not a biologist). This article explains a bit more
about how the coloration (white patches on feet, pandas, blazes) is a
symptom of wider genetic issues, and not related to albinism. It even
links to the genes that can be mutated to produce this effect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucistic
[Posted in FML 7094]