Blog Post Module 6: Inbreeding

Inbreeding is a common phenomenon in natural populations. 

What are some benefits of inbreeding that may lead to the evolution of assortative mating? 

-  Inbreeding is the mating or breeding of individuals that are closely and genetically related. Inbreeding is an example of self-fertilization, which typically results in specific genotypes. Assortative mating occurs when organisms determine their mates based on genotypes and phenotypes that are similar to their own. Inbreeding can promote adaptation and may act as an exit strategy for some endangered species. The benefits of inbreeding may have led to the evolution of assortative mating. In a scenario where two related organisms both exhibit desirable traits within a population and mate, their offspring could potentially obtain those same desirable traits.

What are some of the costs of inbreeding that may have prompted to evolution of inbreeding avoidance (disassortative mating)?

- There are much more costs of inbreeding than there are benefits. For one, inbreeding leads to an excess amount of homozygotes. This raises the probability of organisms to be homozygous for recessive deleterious alleles. This leads to a negative fitness for the organisms and reduces the average fitness within the population. This can lead to extinction for some organisms (endangered species). These costs may have prompted the evolution of disassortative mating. Disassortative mating is the opposite of assortative mating meaning organisms determine their mates based on genotypes and phenotypes that are different from their own. 

- Just a side note, this is a picture of our family bulldog with whom we are obsessed with (We named him Gladstone like the bulldog from Sherlock Holmes).


Comments

  1. Katie E8 October 2021 at 11:02

    Your doggo is adorable! (love the name!!) I think you had really great explanations of what inbreeding is and the correlating benefits and drawbacks.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Celeste Hammond13 October 2021 at 14:53

    Your post was very well structured. I find it interesting that inbreeding consequently led to assortative mating and disassortative mating, two completely opposite mechanisms of evolution. It seems to me as though whether inbreeding leads to assortative or disassortative mating is completely dependent upon the organism itself.

    ReplyDelete

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