Ruiez Island [Ruiez fruit bat] Madagascar 35miles Ruiez On the isolated island o
ID: 149079 • Letter: R
Question
Ruiez Island [Ruiez fruit bat] Madagascar 35miles Ruiez On the isolated island of Ruiez in the Indian Ocean, we find the Ruiez Island fruit bat; it is similar to the White-faced bat of mainland Madagascar (35 miles away). A study in 1990 shows about 350 bats in the Ruiez population. Blood samples show very similar genetics to the mainland, however there is some variations, including 30% of the population is heterozygous for the gene called REU33, which allows the bats to feed on sugar-rich nectar in addition to fruit. In the White-faced bats of Madagascar, the frequency of REU33 is 1%. Rulez Island has very few fruit trees, but many nectar-rich flowers. There is no other fruit or nectar feeding bats on Ruiez, only a couple insect feeding species. A) If you wanted to test if the Ruiez bats are a distinct species from the mainland White-faced bat, what could you do or demonstrate? B) How would you address founder effect in this population?Explanation / Answer
(a) Bats on Ruiez Island are capable of feeding on nectar as well as fruits, while most of the bats on Madagascar can only feed on fruit. To check if the Ruiez bats are a distinct species from the mainland, we can exchange a few bats from both the islands. The Ruiez island bats can survive on Madagascar by eating fruits whereas the Madagascar bats cannot survive on Ruiez island because they can only eat fruits and there are hardly any fruit trees on Ruiez Island. We can infer from this that both are now distinct species, and also, the Ruiez bats are an evolved version of Madagascar bats.
(b) When a new population is established by a few or a relatively small number of organisms of a species, a loss of genetic variation may occur, this is the founder effect. In our case, it could have been, that, a few bats from Madagascar migrated to Ruiez due to some reason and now had to survive there. Initially, they were only accustomed to eating fruits but now have evolved to survive by feeding on nectar as well, due to mutations because of environmental stress. In the process, many of them might have died but now they're adapted to their new environment. This is an extreme case of founder effect where speciation has taken place.
If this answer was helpful, then please give it a good rating, Thank You.
Related Questions
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.