BIOL1130 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Genetic Drift, Albinism, Conservation Genetics

Evolution is change over ____________. Why is evolution an important concept in biology?

What is a population? How can you identify a population in nature?

What is the ultimate source of random variation in a population? Is this the only source of variation, why or why not?

What is a gene pool? Why is it important to our study of evolution?

How is variation inherited in a population? HINT: There are at least two main contributors to this variation. You should be focusing on gametes!

What is microevolution versus macroevolution?

How do the peppered moths show us microevolution in nature? Why is this NOT macroevolution? HINT: you should consider alleles and mating in your answer.

Do you believe that the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium is common in nature? Why or why not? In your answer, you should incorporate your knowledge of populations, evolution, and genetics.

Evolution is driven by adaptation and natural selection. In populations, we refer to organisms that are “most fit.” Explain how evolution and the environment would result in organisms that are “most fit.” In your answer, indicate whether the “most fit” organism today is likely to be the “most fit” organism in the future and why.

Microevolution is a change in the frequency of ___________________ in a population but has not resulted in a speciation event thus far. Given this, what factors could lead to a speciation event for this population?

How would you know that a population had divided into two different species (macroevolution)? How could you test for a speciation event experimentally?

Q1. What is the founder effect?

Sampling error that occurs during the establishment of a newpopulation by a small number of migrants.

Strong natural selection acting on the founders of a newpopulation because the environment they are now living in is sodifferent from the environment they came from.

A phenomenon named after William Founder, who observed that toppredators generally have low genetic diversity.

Rapid population growth following a bottleneck.

Q2. The effects of genetic drift are more pronounced in largerpopulations.

True

False

Q3. Inbreeding tends to increase the proportion of homozygousindividuals in a population (i.e. individuals that have two copiesof the same allele).

True

False

Q4. The effective size of a population is:

The size of an idealized randomly-mating population that is notunder selection and has the same heterozygosity as the actualpopulation.

The size of an idealized randomly-mating population that has thesame heterozygosity as the actual population, but does not loseheterozygosity over time.

The size of an idealized randomly-mating population losinghomozygosity at the same rate as the actual population.

The size of an idealized randomly-mating population losingheterozygosity at the same rate as the actual population.

Q5. Which of the following tends to reduce the effective size ofa population?

Check all that apply:

Increasing the population size.

A biased sex ratio.

Non-random mating.

Q6. If gametes from a gene pool combine randomly to make only asmall number of zygotes, the allele frequencies among the zygotesmay be different than they were in the gene pool because:

The effects of natural selection are more pronounced in smallpopulations.

The effects of genetic drift over several generations are morepronounced with small numbers of gametes.

The effects of differences in frequencies for different allelesare more pronounced with small numbers of zygotes.

The effects of sampling error are more pronounced with smallsamples.

Q7. Genetic drift is different from natural selectionbecause:

In natural selection allele frequencies change because somealleles confer higher fitness, whereas in genetic drift allelefrequencies change because of chance sampling error.

Natural selection acts primarily in large populations, whereasgenetic drift acts primarily in small ones.

Natural selection is a mechanism of evolution, whereas geneticdrift is an outcome of evolution.

Natural selection tends to cause rapid evolution, whereasgenetic drift tends to cause slow evolution.

Q8. Imagine a population evolving by genetic drift in which thefrequency of allele K is 0.65. What is the probability that at somepoint in the future allele K will drift to a frequency of 1?

Q9. A dwindling population of 1000 frogs occupies an isolatedwatershed in Costa Rica. To help preserve the species, scientistscaught 20 frogs to start a new population in a nearby watershed.This species has a gene that affects eye shape. The 1000-memberwild population has two alleles for this gene: R and r, withfrequencies 0.7 and 0.3, respectively. What will be the allelefrequencies of R and r in the 20-member founder population?

The frequencies will be 0.7 for R and 0.3 for r.

The frequencies will be 1.0 for R and 0 for r.

The expected frequencies are 0.7 for R and 0.3 for r. The actualfrequencies could be different.

The founder populations's allele frequencies will necessarily bedifferent than the source population's frequencies.

Q10. For a population containing 90 females and 10 males, whatis the effective population size, N_e ?

1. A) Explain how changes in the environment drive evolutionary change. B) Provide and explain an example

2. A) Explain how the Hardy-Weinberg equation allows us to find evidence of evolution. B) Could processes other than Natural Selection result in deviation from the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium? List and explain each one: C) define what the process is and D) the effect it has on the allele frequency.

3. A gene that is responsible for multiple traits (pleiotropy), for example the same allele causes sickle-cell anemia and provides resistance to malaria. Would a gene that controls these two traits respond equally to natural selection favoring malaria resistance as a non-pleitropic gene that only controls malaria resistance? Explain your answer.

4. A) Explain how lack of genetic variation limits evolution and provide an example. B) Explain how epistasis limits evolution and provide an example

Questions 5-6 are based on the following:

Let’s say you are studying a population of Japanese four o’clock plants. In these plants, the allele for red color flower shows incomplete dominance over the allele for white flowers. This is very convenient for this experiment because you can distinguish the heterozygous (pink flowers) from the homozygous dominant (red flowers). For your experiment, you produced a large number of plants, 25% had red flowers, 25% had white flowers and 50% had pink flowers. You transplanted them into different habitats and left some in the lab (using the same proportions in all the habitats). You waited a few years, while plants reproduce for a few generations and then you go back and resample the populations you’ve transplanted.

5. In the lab you ensured that all individuals receive all requirements to grow and reproduce and mate randomly. A) What do you expect the distribution of the phenotypes after a few generations breeding in the lab? B) Is the lab population in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium? Yes/No, explain

6. In habitat A, you find that you only have red flowering plants and white flowering plants but there are no pink flowering plants. A) Is the population in habitat A in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium? Yes/No, explain. B) Which one(s) of the five agents of evolutionary change could be responsible for these results? Explain. C) What type(s) of selection (stabilizing, disruptive, directional, oscillating, etc...) could be responsible for the results in habitat A? Explain