Her, a gene required for sexual differentiation in Drosophila, encodes a zinc finger protein with characteristics of ZFY-like proteins and is expressed independently of the sex determination hierarchy.

The zygotic function of the hermaphrodite (her) gene of Drosophila plays an important role in sexual differentiation. Our molecular genetic characterization of her suggests that her is expressed sex non-specifically and independently of other known sex determination genes and that it acts together with the last genes in the sex determination hierarchy, doublesex and intersex, to control female sexual differentiation. Consistent with such a terminal function in sexual differentiation, her encodes a protein with C2H2-type zinc fingers. The her zinc fingers are atypical and similar to the even-numbered zinc fingers of ZFY and ZFX proteins in humans and other vertebrates.