Population Study with Drosophila Progress

Figure 1                                                                                                            Figure 2

Raegan and I have recently collected data pertaining to our Drosophila population cross. The first data, where, in the figures, the dark blue represents tube A, the red represents tube B, the yellow tube C, the green tube D, the orange tube E, and the light blue tube F, we collected on Friday October 12th, 2018 while the second data (with the same legend) we collected on October 17th, 2018. As the figures highlight, all tubes experienced significant population increase, yet there is no significant distinction between tubes that started with one male and one female (A-C) rather than those that started with one male and three females (D-F). I originally thought that a notable distinction would occur between these two subsets, yet our sources of error (i.e. miscounting, escape of flies, and accidental killing of flies while counting) do not seem large enough to have such a significant effect. Thinking about how scientists model population, it can be assumed that, in terms of a logistic growth model, our fly population has grown exponentially as our first data collection represented approximately two weeks after we had isolated the “p” generation whereas our second data collection (where tube B grew by 286.1%, C 445.5%, D 269.7%, E 840%, and F 419%) was only five days after the first. Updates will follow regarding this particular experiment!