The 30,000 elephant seals alive today are genetically very similar due to

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The bottleneck effect occurs when a population's size is significantly reduced for at least one generation, causing a loss of genetic variation. The surviving population is not genetically representative of the original population, leading to a decrease in genetic diversity. This is what happened with the elephant seals, which were hunted to near extinction, leaving a small surviving population that all present-day elephant seals are descended from.

The 30,000 Elephant Seals Alive Today Are Genetically Very Similar