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Stabilizing selection (not to be confused with negative or purifying selection [1] [2]) is a type of natural selection in which the population mean stabilizes on a particular non-extreme trait value. This is thought to be the most common mechanism of action for natural selection because most traits do not appear to change drastically over time ...
Disruptive selection is a specific type of natural selection that actively selects against the intermediate in a population, favoring both extremes of the spectrum. Disruptive selection is inferred to oftentimes lead to sympatric speciation through a phyletic gradualism mode of evolution.
In population genetics, directional selection is a type of natural selection in which one extreme phenotype is favored over both the other extreme and moderate phenotypes. This genetic selection causes the allele frequency to shift toward the chosen extreme over time as allele ratios change from generation to generation.
Selection can be divided into three classes, on the basis of its effect on allele frequencies: directional, stabilizing, and disruptive selection. [103] Directional selection occurs when an allele has a greater fitness than others, so that it increases in frequency, gaining an increasing share in the population.
In a study of the fresh-water Eurasian perch, a change in fitness was reported with a change in their density. An estimate of the selection gradient by linear and quadratic regression indicated a shift of the selection regime between stabilizing and directional selection at low density to disruptive selection at higher density. [11]
The most common explanation for biological constraint is that stabilizing selection acts on an organism to prevent it changing, for example, so that it can continue to function in a tightly-defined niche. This may be considered to be a form of external constraint, in the sense that the organism is constrained not by its makeup or genetics, but ...
Punctuated equilibrium is commonly contrasted with phyletic gradualism, the idea that evolution generally occurs uniformly by the steady and gradual transformation of whole lineages . [ 2 ] In 1972, paleontologists Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould published a landmark paper developing their theory and called it punctuated equilibria . [ 1 ]
Fisher's fundamental theorem of natural selection is an idea about genetic variance [1] [2] in population genetics developed by the statistician and evolutionary biologist Ronald Fisher. The proper way of applying the abstract mathematics of the theorem to actual biology has been a matter of some debate, however, it is a true theorem.