Artificial Selection 🥽

Natural selection is driven by nature and environmental changes that may encourage populations to evolve to adapt with their new circumstances, but what about artificial selection? Human activities (e.g., agricultural activities) and preferences of traits are the main motive behind artificial selection.

Artificial Selection’s Impact on Diversity

Selective breeding is where organisms with desirable properties are intentionally chosen by humans to breed together in order to increase these properties’ frequency and/or change genetic variation.

Examples of Increasing Certain Traits

— Breeding specific cows to obtain higher quality milk.

— Selection of dogs to reproduce and pass off certain physical traits such as: size, coat, facial structure and behavior to their offspring.

— Developing sweet, large fruits from crops.

Example of Changing Genetic Variation

— Focusing on just a few "ideal" traits can reduce overall genetic variation.

— Creating genetic bottlenecks where only a small subset of genes continue in the population.

— Introducing specific traits from one population into another.

— Maintaining variations that might disappear in natural conditions.

Rapid Changes

Artificial selection can lead to fundamental changes because of human control on individuals’ breeding, protection and implementing selective pressure events simultaneously.

Trade-Offs

Unintended consequences can occur during breeding, like diseases and low fertility.

— Example: some dogs may suffer diseases linked to their traits.

Dependence on Humans

Many domestic kept animals rely on humans to provide them with sustainable conditions for survival.

— Example: domestic cats, hamsters or puppies.