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    Natural Selection

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    Masai Pace
    This document describes a natural selection simulation assignment. It provides the experimental question, procedure, data collected from running simulations in different environments (desert, mountain, grassland), and analysis and discussion questions. The key findings are that in the desert brown individuals were most successful at blending in, in the mountain environment gray and brown had similar success rates, and in the grassland gray had a slight advantage.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Natural Selection

    Uploaded by

    Masai Pace
    124 views5 pages
    This document describes a natural selection simulation assignment. It provides the experimental question, procedure, data collected from running simulations in different environments (desert, mountain, grassland), and analysis and discussion questions. The key findings are that in the desert brown individuals were most successful at blending in, in the mountain environment gray and brown had similar success rates, and in the grassland gray had a slight advantage.

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    This document describes a natural selection simulation assignment. It provides the experimental question, procedure, data collected from running simulations in different environments (desert, mountain, grassland), and analysis and discussion questions. The key findings are that in the desert brown individuals were most successful at blending in, in the mountain environment gray and brown had similar success rates, and in the grassland gray had a slight advantage.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    124 views5 pages

    Natural Selection

    Uploaded by

    Masai Pace
    This document describes a natural selection simulation assignment. It provides the experimental question, procedure, data collected from running simulations in different environments (desert, mountain, grassland), and analysis and discussion questions. The key findings are that in the desert brown individuals were most successful at blending in, in the mountain environment gray and brown had similar success rates, and in the grassland gray had a slight advantage.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    GENERAL BIOLOGY II – Natural Selection simulation assignment

    Natural Selection

    Name: Masai Pace

    Experimental Question: How does the environment affect the survival of these organisms?

    Procedure:

    1. Click on “Introduction” to read about the simulation.

    2. Write a hypothesis for each environment:


    a. Desert Sand:

    The brown individuals will be much more successful as they will blend in better

    b. Mountain Rock:

    The gray individuals will be much more successful as they will blend in better

    c. Grassland:

    The brown individuals will be moderately more successful as they blend in slightly better

    3. Run the simulation 3 times for each environment (desert, mountain, and grassland) and record
    your data.

    4. Calculate and record averages for your data.

    5. Complete the analysis and discussion questions.

    Data:
    GENERAL BIOLOGY II – Natural Selection simulation assignment

    Desert Sand Environment

    Trial Starting % Gray Starting % Brown Ending % Gray Ending % Brown

    1 42% 58% 17% 83%

    2 42% 58% 37% 63%

    3 42% 58% 13% 87%

    Average 42 58 22 78

    Mountain Rock Environment

    Trial Starting % Gray Starting % Brown Ending % Gray Ending % Brown

    1 52 48 72 28

    2 40 60 50 50

    3 38 62 50 50

    Average 43 57 57 42

    Grassland Environment

    Trial Starting % Gray Starting % Brown Ending % Gray Ending % Brown

    1 54 46 57 43

    2 56 44 66 34

    3 48 52 42 58

    Average 53 47 55 53
    GENERAL BIOLOGY II – Natural Selection simulation assignment

    Analysis:

    Desert Sand:

    The brown individuals were much more successful as they blended in better

    Mountain Rock:

    The gray individuals were successful but not much more so than brown
    individuals, their color only seemed to give them a slight advantage

    Grassland:

    The gray individuals seemed to have a slight advantage over the brown
    individuals in the grassy terrain

    Discussion:

    1. Describe factors that can cause environmental change.

    Climate, Natural disasters, human activity


    GENERAL BIOLOGY II – Natural Selection simulation assignment

    2. Describe industrial melanism and the effect it had on peppered moths based on the video on
    Natural Selection.

    Industrial Melanism is when animals develop dark-colored skin/fur/feathers to adapt to a


    soot-darkened environment caused by human industry. As London became more soot-covered,
    lighter-colored moths were easier to see by predators and thus were preyed upon more frequently
    and moths that happened to be darker were harder to see by predators and were more likely to
    survive and pass on their genes

    3. Describe an example of another species that has undergone an evolution in response to


    human-driven environmental changes.

    Cimex lectularius or the common bedbug, have developed thicker exoskeletons and faster
    metabolisms over the years in order to survive the pesticides commonly used on them by humans

    4. What could lead to different populations of the same species living in different environments?

    One group splits off from the larger population and migrates somewhere else
    GENERAL BIOLOGY II – Natural Selection simulation assignment

    5. Grizzly bears and polar bears are very closely related, so much so that they can reproduce to
    form hybrid offspring. Use your understanding of natural selection to describe how polar bears
    became a separate classification from the grizzly.

    A group of grizzly bears split off from the larger grizzly bear population of wherever and settle in the
    arctic circle (possibly by way of a land bridge) and are cut off from the rest. The grizzly bear population
    begins to adapt to the conditions of the arctic circle and after thousands of years, polar bears as we
    know them exist

    6. Describe how grizzly and polar bear evolution may be affected by climate change.

    Bears might begin to grow thinner pelts in response to the increasing temperatures.
    Polar bears, specifically, might begin to regain their brown fur as year-round winters cease to occur.

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