Investigate the use of data analysis

EasyBio > Heredity > Inheritance Patterns in a Population > Investigate the use of data analysis

Investigate the use of data analysis from a large-scale collaborative project to identify trends, patterns and relationships, for example: (ACSBL064, ACSBL073)

• the use of population genetics data in conservation management
• population genetics studies used to determine the inheritance of a disease or disorder
• population genetics relating to human evolution

Use of population genetics data in conservation management:

• Population genetics focuses on studying genetic diversity of organisms in a population.
• Information can be gathered regarding how much of variation have been happening within a population of species and measures can be taken to prevent extensive variation and preservation of wild-type basing on that.
• By assuming that there are loci that control the genetic system itself, population genetic models are created to describe:
• The evolution of dominance
• The evolution of sexual reproduction and recombination rates
• The evolution of mutation rates
• The evolution of evolutionary capacitors
• The evolution of costly signalling traits
• The evolution of ageing
• The evolution of co-operation

Use of population genetics for determining inheritance of a disease or disorder:

• Observation of interactions between genes can give idea about what alleles might be dominant and whether disease causing alleles will show dominancy or not.
• Basing on such ideas, whether a disease can be inherited or not can be determined.
• A number of techniques in population genetics are used to measure allelic frequencies in a population, thus giving us an image of what number of alleles are being lost during evolution and what amount are being transferred through gene flow. Analysing these data can give us a rough image of the probabilities of inheriting disorders within a population.

Population Genetics relating to human evolution:

• Questions about human evolution are addressed through analysis of the fossil and archaeological records, combined with analyses of diversity in living human populations.
• Higher genetic diversity in Africa has been said to indicate an origin in Africa, but in fact, the characteristic pattern of this diversity indicates only a larger number of ancestors, not greater time-depth, within Africa.
• The oldest fossils showing modern human characteristics have been found in Africa and date to about 130,000 years ago. The oldest related modern human fossils outside of Africa appear in the Middle East, dating from about 90,000 years ago.
• An alternative view is that humans have been evolving within a single evolutionary population, which, though structured, has been prevented from divergence into a new species within the last million years by gene flow.
• Larger genetic distances between populations in subSaharan Africa and those in Europe or Asia generate ideas that people have migrated out of Africa and thus, the genetic variations in populations have split globally.
• However, variable rates of genetic drift and gene flow between continental regions are a more likely explanation for observed geographic patterns of diversity.
• The main point is that genetic diversity data can be interpreted to fit either model for modern human origins, and therefore have not resolved the debate.

Extract from HSC Biology Stage 6 Syllabus. © 2017 Board of Studies NSW.