Question

In a bird species, the shape of the beak is encoded by a locus with two 2 co-dominant alleles Na and Nz. Na gives long beak in double dose, while individuals who are homozygous for Nz have short beak.

In a population, the following genotype frequencies were observed:

Na Na = 0.5
Na Nz = 0.3
Nz Nz = 0.2

a) Assume a total of 600 individuals in the population. Set up a hypothesis and use an x2 test to test if the allele frequency is in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.
b) What factors determine whether the genotype frequencies in a population follow the Hardy-Weinberg principle or not?
c) Why can you determine the genotype frequencies in the bird population without using molecular genetic methods?

Answer 1

b)The parameters that have to be there if the genotype frequencies follow Hardy-weinberg equilibrium are -There should be no mutation,no migration,no genetic drift, there should be random mating and there should be a large population.These parameters are needed to atleast pass on a partticular gene to the next generation at a predictable level.