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Horizon Education and Media
What have the three foods at the top in common with the three foods below?
A grain?
A root?
A fruit?
Modern sweet corn (maize)
Modern carrots
Modern bananas
Artificial Selection/Selective Breeding
Artificial Selection/Selective Breeding
The three foods at the top are ancient varieties of the three foods below!
There are only three crops in these images, because one is the ancient form and one is the modern form. Tiny ancient corn husks, the gnarly root of an ancient carrot, and the seedy ancient banana were bred into the foods we know today by artificial selection, also known as selective breeding. Farmers select crops for traits that are more nutritious, productive, and tasty which changes the crop genetics over thousands and thousand of years.
Hairless Xolos
Hairless Xolos
In many ways, artificial selection of genes is a type of genetic engineering. Dog breeds result from artificial selection. Natural selection occurs when the natural environment does this selection on a population over time. Artificial selection is when humans do the selecting.
In this activity about Breeding Mexican Hairless Xolo Dogs you will see how selection of one trait, hairlessness, affects other traits in the dogs.
From the desk of Hannah Robinson
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