Dr. Waldvogel died on May 30, 2009. If you want to find out more about him, please visit the virtual memorial. I do not know if Jerry Waldvogel remembers the help he gave us on this webpage, but I remember. Also through this applet he has taught and will continue to teach people interested in this this basic genetic model.

Edward "Ted" Doyle, PhD

INTRODUCTION
This interactive animation models genetic characteristics in a population. A population consists of individuals whose genetic construction is very similar. But if we take the the genetic structure of all the individuals in the entire population, then we will find segments of the population with varying percentages of particular allele combinations. The population can be divided in sub-populations, and it could be possible that individuals of those populations can share some similar traits. For example, the people of south east asia, which is the sub-population of the total global population, tend to share similar facial features of high cheekbones and black hair. This characteristic is known as a Trait. Variation in traits is coded in the genes of individuals of the population. All the individuals in a particular kind of species inherit the same number of genes but a little bit of variation in their chemical composition, which leads to variation in traits (commonly known as Phenotypes ). Phenotypes are manifestation of DNA differences, and the different forms of DNA at specific gene loci are known as Alleles




HARDY WEINBERG PRINCIPLE
According to this principle, the genotype frequencies for a population in equiblrium wil fit the formula:-
............ P*P + 2*P*Q + Q*Q
where P is the frequency of the allele A and Q is the frequency of allele B.

The allele frequencies and the genotypic frequencies will be stable from generation to generation if the following assumption is true:-

" There is no mutation, the population size is large and is isolated from other populations, mating is random and all genotypes are equally viable and fertile."



WHAT DOES THIS SIMULATION DO
This simulation computes discrete difference equation for population shifts that accounts for changes in the Hardy-Weinberg assumptions that are written above. The user will start the simulation by pressing the Enter Values button. This will pop up a new window. The following steps are then to be taken to run the simulation succcessfully:-

Enter the allele description for both alleles
Select the allele frequencies by scrolling the scroll bar
Enter the genotype description for all the three genes
Select a selection factor for each of the genotype by scrolling the scroll bar
Press "Okay" button to see the results