Question

In the 1960s, a population of squirrels was being studied in Alabama and the coat color of the squirrels was found to range from the more common gray color (dominant) to the less common red color (recessive). When they sampled an area, they found 536 gray squirrels and 64 red squirrels. Assuming the population is at Hardy Weinberg's equilibrium, answer the following questions:1. What is the frequency of the homozygous recessive individuals?

Answer 1

Answer: Assuming the population is at Hardy Weinberg's equilibrium, the frequency of the homozygous recessive individuals is 0.107

Explanation: Hardy-Weinberg law provides an equation to relate genotype frequencies and allele frequencies in a randomly mating population. p² + 2pq + q² = 1 where p² = homozygous dominant, q² = homozygous recessive and 2pq = heterozygous.

Also, for two alleles, p and q, p + q = 1

Using these equations and the information provided in the question given, the total number of squirrels is 600.

Grey squirrels frequency, p² = 536/600 = 0.893

Red squirrels frequency, q² = 64/600 = 0.107

Therefore, the frequency of recessive individuals (Red) = 0.107