ANS3701 Assignment 6
Semester 2 2024 - DUE 30
September 2024
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, ANS3701 Assignment 6 Semester 2 2024 - DUE 30 September 2024
Question 1
In conservation genetics, heterozygosity is a fundamental measure of genetic diversity
within a population. For example, if a population of leopards has an observed
heterozygosity (Ho) of 0.35, this means 35% of individuals possess different alleles at a
given genetic locus. In comparison, expected heterozygosity (He) represents the level
of genetic variation expected under random mating, and a much higher He value of, for
example, 0.52 would indicate potential inbreeding or genetic drift, thus reducing
diversity in this population. The inbreeding coefficient (Fis) quantifies the extent of
inbreeding, with values closer to 1 suggesting higher levels of inbreeding. If a population
of leopards shows a Fis of 0.33, it points to a significant reduction in genetic diversity
compared to a connected population with a lower Fis of, for example, 0.05. When
populations experience events like genetic bottlenecks, where population numbers
decrease drastically, allele frequencies become skewed, resulting in reduced allelic
richness (i.e. the number of alleles per locus). This can be detected through genetic
tests like the M-ratio, where a low value may signal the effects of a bottleneck. 2
Effective population size (Ne) refers to the number of individuals contributing to the next
generation's gene pool (i.e., the number of reproductive individuals in a population) and
is often lower than the censused population size due to factors like unequal sex ratios or
varying reproductive success. For example, if a population census size is 120 but the
Ne is only 40, this would indicate genetic vulnerability even though the actual population
size is quite large. Consider the following scenario and answer the questions that follow.
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