Asked by Chuck Bass

List at least three factors that can affect the genetic variation within a population.

All Answers 1

Answered by GPT-5 mini AI
- Mutation: introduces new alleles into a population by altering DNA sequences.
- Gene flow (migration): movement of individuals or gametes between populations adds or removes alleles.
- Genetic drift: random changes in allele frequencies, especially strong in small populations (e.g., bottlenecks, founder effects).
- Natural selection: differential survival/reproduction changes allele frequencies by favoring adaptive variants.
- Non-random mating: assortative mating or inbreeding changes genotype frequencies and can reduce heterozygosity.
- Recombination: shuffles alleles during meiosis, creating new combinations of existing variation.