Reference no: EM133288398
Assignment:
1. In populations under Treatment A, the adult census population size is maintained at exactly 80 females and 80 males per generation. Individuals of each sex are randomly paired and all reproduction is monogamous.
2. In populations under Treatment B, the adult census size is 40 females and 120 males per generation. Mating combinations are left to occur naturally (they are not experimentally manipulated): individuals are able to choose their mates; each individual potentially mates singly, with multiple partners, or not at all.
These types of experiments are fairly common and are usually designed to test whether different types of adaptations evolve in populations with different mating systems. However, you will explore whether the mating system manipulation is likely to affect the amount of genetic drift in each experimental population.
Ne= 4NfNm/Nf+Nm
Where Nf is the effective number of females in the population and Nm is the effective number of males. Note that Nf and Nm do not necessarily have to be the same as the census numbers of females and males of the population. For example, Nf might be less than the census number of females per generation, and Nm might be less than the census number of males. Such scenarios would occur when there is high variation among individuals in number of offspring produced (see discussion of the Buri experiment and question 4 of the Week 9 lab).
Calculate Ne for each of the two experimental evolution treatments (treatments A and B) under the assumption that Nf and Nm correspond to the female and male census sizes (respectively) for each treatment. Under this assumption, your Necalculations will represent upper limits for the true effective population size of each experimental population. Discuss, with references to your calculations, whether and how much you expect genetic drift to differ between populations evolving under each of the two treatments.