Genetics and Evolutionary Biology

Heredity is the transmission of traits from parents to offspring through genes. Variation refers to differences between individuals, evolution is change over generations, and diversity is variety within a population.

Repetitive sequences of each individual are unique.

The source of these alien genes was mostly male American soldiers. Since they left Vietnam, they were only visitors. However, by successfully mating with Vietnamese women, they left copies of their genes in south-east Asia.

Both mutation and gene flow can cause new variations of genes to enter a population's gene pool. However, only mutation can introduce them into the gene pool of an entire species.

Non-random mating of any sort can cause a change in population's gene pool frequencies, independent of any other evolutionary mechanism. Consanguineous mating (or inbreeding) is a form of non-random mating.

Intergeneric hybridisation is used when the genes for desirable characters are not found between two different genera of the same family.

Epigenetics is the study of cellular and physiological trait variations that are not caused by changes in the DNA sequence.

Genetic algorithms are computational methods inspired by natural selection and artificial phenotype selection. They use principles like mutation, crossover, and selection to evolve solutions to optimization problems. MOD and ClustalW serve different purposes in bioinformatics.

  Gene flow does occur between the populations of a species as they freely interbreed.so new genetic combinations occur.

Reproduction ensures continuity of species by producing new individuals. Without reproduction, species would become extinct. Nutrition is about obtaining energy, speciation is the formation of new species, and variation is genetic diversity - none directly maintain continuity.

Natural selection is most likely to result in the genetic change of a population when a stress is severe, constant and long term. Selection usually will favour the successful adaptation resulting in its increased frequency in subsequent generations.

If individuals can respond more successfully, they will usually be more healthy and vigorous. As a result, they are more likely to live longer and to reproduce. The net result will be that their genes will be more common in subsequent generations.

Frameshift mutation affects more than one amino acid. Due to the triplet nature of gene expression by codons, the insertion or deletion can change the reading frame resulting in a completely different translation from the original.

In both cases, i.e. falciparum resistance and abnormal mucus production, mutation in one gene results in more than one phenotypic trait. Thus, both are examples of pleiotropy.

A neutral mutation has no harmful or beneficial effect on the organism. Such mutations occur at a steady rate, forming the basis for the molecular clock. In the neutral theory of molecular evolution, neutral mutations provide genetic drift as the basis for most variation at the molecular level.