Natural and Sexual Selection of Vestigial and Wild Type...

Natural and Sexual Selection of Vestigial and Wild Type Drosophila melanogaster Abstract In this experiment, vestigial flies as well as wild type flies were used to create some diversity as well as test one of our hypotheses. Our hypotheses are as follows; 1) The wild type flies will have a greater relative fitness compared to the vestigial flies based on only sexual selection. The wild type has a relative fitness of 1 since it has fully functional wings. Vestigial Winged flies are not as sexually appealing since their wings are not functional and the wing movement is a vital part of their mating ritual. 2) The vestigial fly will have a greater relative fitness when considering both sexual and natural selection. With the presence of†¦show more content†¦With the presence of natural selection (fly paper hanging from top of cage) posing a larger threat to the wild flies b/c they can fly better, this will allow vestigial flies to prosper better. Materials and Methods To set up this experiment, two twenty-five gallon aquariums, 3 petri-dishes, 200 flies, rotten bananas, and yeast were used. The bananas chosen to be an accelerant for the growth of the yeast and were frozen so they would be easier to cut. The yeast was used because the drosophila melanogaster prefer this as a food source. The vestigial and wild type flies were sexed (to determine their sex), sorted, and counted. An initial population size of 100 total flies was decided so that it would be easier to determine the phenotypic percentage of the total population. Fly paper was placed in one of the sets of cages to impose a method of natural selection as well as the sexual selection which is being solely tested by the other set of cages. It was decided that there would be 80 vestigial flies and 20 wild type flies to total to an initial population of 100 drosophila. Next, the flies were anesthetized flies using Fly Nap. The flies were counted out to reach desired ratio, sexing the flies making sure there are equal amounts of males and females to be sure there is ample individuals to allow successful mating. The fly’s food was prepared by taking a frozen rotten banana, cutting it in half, mashing up the banana meat, and mixing yeast into it. The