founder effect

American  

noun

Biology.

1. the accumulation of random genetic changes in an isolated population as a result of its proliferation from only a few parent colonizers.

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Example Sentences

In isolated populations like Sardinia’s, where inbreeding was common, such rare variants can become more frequent, a phenomenon called the founder effect.

From Science Magazine • Nov. 20, 2024

An event that initiates an allele frequency change in an isolated part of the population, which is not typical of the original population, is called the founder effect.

From Textbooks • Jun. 9, 2022

Both the bottleneck effect and the founder effect reduce genetic variation within a population—and genetic variation is the basis for natural selection.

From Textbooks • Jun. 9, 2022

In this situation, those individuals are unlikely to be representative of the entire population, a phenomenon called the founder effect.

From Textbooks • Jun. 9, 2022

The founder effect occurs when the genetic structure matches that of the new population’s founding fathers and mothers.

From Textbooks • Apr. 25, 2013