IV. Demography and
Population Growth
A. Demography and defining populations
1. Challenges in Defining populations
2. Density (mark/recapture techniques
and assumptions)
3.Dispersion (testing against Poisson distribution, meaning of non-random
distributions.)
a.
hyper
b.
random
c.
aggregated
4. Distribution (again challenges in
defining boundaries)
B. Age Structure
1. Examining age structure
a.
survivorship curves (which types of organisms, what does it mean?)
i. types I
ii. type II
iii. type III (which
types of organisms, what does it mean?)
2. Reproductive potential and age
structure
C. Sex Ratio
1. Examining sex ratio (when?)
2. Where 1:1 is not optimal.
D. Life Tables
1. use life
tables to examine population characteristics
2. types
a.
static
b.
cohort
3. how to do
calculations
4. how to
interpret data.
NOTE use of human data on
internet to demonstrate points –
http://www-popexpo.ined.fr/english.html and
http://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/
Further note use of Populus to demonstrate course concepts:
http://www.cbs.umn.edu/populus/
E. Growth Potential
1. Exponential growth (discrete and
continuous)
a.
formulas
b.
graph
c. Malthus
2. Logistic or sigmoid growth (discrete
and continuous)
a.
formula
b.
graph
V. Population Regulation
A. Definitions
1. formula
for logistic growth
2. population
regulation vs. control
B.
Population Fluctuations
1. Small magnitude.
2. large
scale
3. Irruptions (revisit with chaos and
with lagged continuous)
C. Equilibrium Theories
1. Density Dependent (Lack)
a.
intrinsic
b.
extrinsic
2. Density Independent
(non-equilibrium) (Andrewartha and Birch)
3. Top-down vs. bottom-up
D. Metapopulations
E. Evaluate changes in population growth in populus
1. continuous
growth
2. Continuous growth with time lag
3. Discrete growth
4. Discrete growth with time lag
5. Discrete growth at different
values of r
a.
monotonic convergence
b. Damped oscillations
c.
stable limit cycles
d.
multiple fixed point limit cycles
e.
chaos
f. Allee effect
Techniques include cobwebbing and different sorts of graphs.
6. Demographic accidents
7. Dispersal
a.
presaturation
b.
saturation
8. Habitat Fragmentation
9. Revisit dangers of small population size
VI. Intraspecific
Variation
A. Sources of Varation
1 Genes
2Environment
3 G*E
4 Discuss additive genetic variance
and other forms of variation
5
other terms (mutation, migration, recombination, independent assortment, heterosis, genetic
drift)
6 discuss situations that enhance
genetic variation
B. Measuring Genetic Variance – when are these
different methods appropriate?
1. Morphology – can reflect genetic,
environmental variation or phenotypic plasticity
2. Chromosomes – karyotype
– examine subject species, some are more appropriate than others
3. Allozymes
– genetic similarity and distance, sensitivity?
4. DNA – when to use DNA? Conservative?
5. mDNA – when is mDNA more
appropriate?
C. Interaction between Genes and Environment
PHENOTYPIC PLASTICITY
D. Dispersal
E. Interactions between processes
1. Selection
2. Genetic Drift (types)
3. Population size and sensitivity
VII. Life History
A. Body Size
1. Surface area to volume ratio
2.
Reynolds Number
3.
Cope’s Law
4.
Allometry
B. Metamorphosis (neoteny)
C. Dealing
with extremes
1. Diapause
2. Migration
3. Adapt
D. Senescence (Reproductive Valueand
fecundity - revisit boar lab for review)
E. Reproductive Strategies
1. Revisit board games and discussion
to review
2. e.g. Iteroparity
and semelparity
F. r and K selection