Part II: Evolution and Natural Selection

In the previous assignment you learned that

• Evolution is the change in the gene pool over generations
• Evolution is caused by small population size, non-random mating, mutations, gene flow and natural selection

Natural Selection 

While it is true that there are several other causes of evolution, natural selection is the  most important one. We will focus on natural selection for this assignment.  We want to learn the following

Natural selection is defined as

 a difference in the survival and reproduction of individuals in a population'

I think of this as ''Nature'' or the environment selecting which individuals do better than others and therefore survive and reproduce. There are three conditions necessary for natural selection to occur. This video does a nice job of presenting these three requirements.   

• • • Variation:  this means genetic variation in the population 
    • Heritability: this means that the differences between individuals is genetic 
    • Reproductive Success: this means that some individuals survive and reproduce better than others. 

Natural Selection and Adaptation 

In this video, I will go over natural selection, the requirements for natural selection, examples of natural selection and the connection to adaptations.