Problem:
The habitat of one species of tropical fish is red coral reefs. The large majority of the fish in this population are red. A few individual fish carry a mutation that prevents the production of the red pigment; as a result these individual fish are white. The temperature of the ocean where these fish live gets warmer and warmer over a 10 year period, and as a result the coral is bleached and turns white. Use what you have learned about natural selection to explain how this bleaching event may have affected the evolution this fish population (not including possible direct effects of warmer temperatures on the fish).
Required:
Include the following terms in your explanation:
- differential reproduction
- beneficial trait
- allele frequency
- selection pressure
- evolution
so any suggestions should ideally aid in this goal.