8.

1 – Natural Selection

PAGES 326-335
 Introduction

— Natural selection does not occur by chance

— Environment selects which species are better suited

for it

— In parts of Africa – individuals have inherited the

sickle-cell anemia allele where there is a high level of
malaria
 Types of Selection

— Directional Selection: selection favours individuals

with more extreme variation of a trait (shift away
from average condition)

— This is very common in artificial breeding where the

desired trait is selected

— Examples include: strawberries being selected for

larger and sweeter fruits, chilli peppers for hotter
flavour and thoroughbred horses for running speed
 Stabilizing Selection

— Stabilizing selection – occurs when the average

phenotype within a population is favoured by the
environment

— Selective pressures can reduce the reproductive

success of individuals with unfavourable traits –
example of the hummingbird and its beak length

— Birth weights are another example, babies over 3kg

are more numerous
 Disruptive Selection

— Disruptive selection favours individuals with

variations at opposite extremes of a trait over
individuals with intermediate variations

— Environmental conditions may favour more than one

phenotype – example of 2 plants with different sized
flowers being available for different hummingbirds
 Sexual Selection

— Good health enhances reproductive success

— Sexual selection = favouring of any trait that

specifically enhances the mating success of an
individual

— Appearances and behaviours are key traits

— Female mate choice and male-vs-male competition

are the most common forms
 Sexual Selection Examples

Female Male Male Bighorn Sheep

 Catch my....Genetic Drift?

— Genetic makeup of a population can change simply by

chance

— The smaller the number of individuals in a population,

the greater the influence of GENETIC DRIFT

— Genetic drift = random shifting of the genetic makeup of

the next generation

— In small populations, genetic drift can result in a

particular allele becoming very common or disappearing
entirely over a number of generations
 Bottlenecks and the Founder Effect

— Genetic bottlenecks result in a loss of genetic

diversity – as an extreme reduction in population
can occur
 Founder Effect

— Occurs when a small number of individuals establish

a new population
 The Hardy-Weinberg Principle

— 2 mathematicians used mathematical reasoning to

explain the relationships between allele frequencies
within a population and the chance of those
frequencies remaining constant

— Hardy-Weinberg principle – in large populations,

when random chance is at work, allele frequencies
are expected to remain constant from generation to
generation
 5 conditions for Hardy-Weinberg Principle to Exist

— Natural selection: favours the passing on of some alleles over

others

— Small population size: increases the likelihood of genetic drift

— Mutation: introduces new alleles to a population

— Immigration or emigration: introduces or removes alleles in a

population

— Horizontal gene transfer: the gaining of new alleles from a

different species
 Homework

— Page 335 #1-5, 7,8,11