7. You are a conservation biologist, studying genetic variation in three populations of an endangered species of ladybug beetle. Population 1 has 20 beetles, two of which have brown spots, a recessive trait; the other nine beetles have red spots. Population 2 has 150 beetles and 15 of them have brown spots, while 135 have red spots. Population 3 has 50 beetles, and five of them have brown spots. In which population is the frequency of the allele for brown spots the highest

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Question: You are a conservation biologist, studying genetic variation in three populations of an endangered species of ladybug beetle. Population 1 has 20 beetles, two of which have brown spots, a recessive trait; the other nine beetles have red spots. Population 2 has 150 beetles and 15 of them have brown spots, while 135 have red spots. Population 3 has 50 beetles, and five of them have brown spots. In which population is the frequency of the allele for brown spots the highest?

a. Population 1

b. Population 2

c. Population 3

d. The frequency of the allele for brown spots is the same in all the three populations.

e. It is not possible to answer this question from the given data.

Answer:

e. It is not possible to answer this question from the given data.

Explanation:

According to the given information, the allele for the brown spots in beetles is recessive. Two copies of a recessive allele are present in a homozygous recessive genotype. A heterozygous dominant genotype carries one copy of the recessive allele. Therefore, to calculate the frequency of recessive allele, information about the number of organisms with homozygous recessive and heterozygous dominant genotypes is required.

No information is given about the number of heterozygotes in the population. The red-spotted beetles might be homozygous or heterozygous for the trait. Therefore, the frequency of the allele for the brown spot cannot be calculated from the given data.