So, I assume that if you put 100 people on a spaceship and sent them to wherever, they’d get very inbred in a few generations. How many people would you need for this to not happen, accounting for the fact that there will eventually be people who are infertile or die before having children?

  • Steve@communick.newsEnglish
    16·
    3 days ago

    This has been modeled. Though I don’t have any references at hand, this is what I remember.

    If you want to allow people to choose mates and breed normally, you’d need at least 3000 people, 4 to 5000 would be better.

    If you are strictly controlling genomes and breeding pairs, ignoring monogamy and social norms. You might be able to get away with 100 if you selected for maximum initial genetic diversity. But 200 would be easier.

    • Ziggurat@jlai.lu
      13·
      3 days ago

      If you are strictly controlling genomes and breeding pairs, ignoring monogamy and social norms. You might be able to get away with 100

      In a Sci fi context where we have generation ships, I would add frozen sperm/eggs to the equation and even artificial womb. In like a 100kg package you can store a lot of genetic material. That’s pretty fucked up (and a nice writing prompt) but definitely doable.

      At this point the question is also cultural what is the minimum amount of person to keep a population able to maintain a large ship over centuries and produce enough food

      • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
        3·
        2 days ago

        i don’t think it’s that fucked up to have everyone with a womb be a surrogate mother, you’d just have to select people who are okay with it. There’s nothing wrong with being a surrogate, it’s basically just adoption except you get to give birth to the child.

    • Triumph@fedia.io
      10·
      3 days ago

      … strictly controlling genomes and breeding pairs, ignoring monogamy and social norms, …

      Now kith

      • Steve@communick.newsEnglish
        6·
        3 days ago

        That low end of 100 would be with full eugenics. Selecting for genetic diversity, not for “hotness”.

        If you were selecting for that, it would mean less genetic diversity, you might start seeing problems within 5 generations. But that’s just me speculating.

    • Atelopus-zeteki@fedia.io
      4·
      3 days ago

      Thanks that’s useful. My guess (WAG), on orders of magnitude was that 1000 would be too small, but 10,000 might be enough.