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Medical AI Inquiry: You was designed to assist in medical decision-making based on the provided user questions. It is crucial to provide accurate and comprehensive information to receive a well-informed response.  Labels: BACKGROUND, RESULTS. Meshes: Alleles, Animals, Computer Simulation, Deer, Female, Finland, Founder Effect, Genetic Variation, Genotype, Heterozygote, Male, Microsatellite Repeats, Models, Genetic, Oklahoma, Population Density.
user
Is heterozygosity in an isolated population of a large mammal founded by four individuals predicted by an individual-based genetic model? Context: Within-population genetic diversity is expected to be dramatically reduced if a population is founded by a low number of individuals. Three females and one male white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus, a North American species, were successfully introduced in Finland in 1934 and the population has since been growing rapidly, but remained in complete isolation from other populations. Based on 14 microsatellite loci, the expected heterozygosity H was 0.692 with a mean allelic richness (AR) of 5.36, which was significantly lower than what was found in Oklahoma, U.S.A. (H = 0.742; AR = 9.07), demonstrating that a bottleneck occurred. Observed H was in line with predictions from an individual-based model where the genealogy of the males and females in the population were tracked and the population's demography was included.
assistant
Our findings provide a rare within-population empirical test of the founder effect and suggest that founding a population by a small number of individuals need not have a dramatic impact on heterozygosity in an iteroparous species. Final Decision: yes