what is conservation genetic why is maintainaning genetic di

what is conservation genetic? why is maintainaning genetic diversity in a population is important?

Solution

Answer:

Conservation genetics is an interdisciplinary subfield of Population Genetics. The population genetics is the study of changes in the frequencies of genes and genotypes within a population. And the conservation genetics is the combination of two terms (conservation biology + genetics). It is the study of the dynamics of genes in populations considering an aim to avoid extinction of a population due to habitat loss, exploitation and environmental change. Thus, for the conservation and restoration of biodiversity, conservation genetics applies the genetic methods. The three fundamental levels of biodiversity are Ecological diversity, Organismal diversity and Genetic diversity.

Genetic diversity is defind as the variation of genes within species. The variation could be in alleles, in entire gene or in the chromosomal structures. And the diversity can be in a population of the same species or within distinct population. The amount of genetic diversity is the basis of speciation. And it is the outcome of three interacting factors:

Example: In human papulation polymorphic for some traits like eye and hair color, blood type etc..

Maintainaning genetic diversity in a population is important as:

If genetic diversity is not maintained it would be resulting to the reduced fitness, decrease in population growth, reduced immunity, and it may ultimately resulting to the higher risk of extinction of a species or population.