Question

What is the relative effective population size at nuclear loci compared to mitochondrial loci (assuming a 1:1 sex ratio)? Why is Ne not equal for nuclear and mitochondrial loci?

Answer 1

The effective population size is the number of individuals that an idealised population would need to have in order for some specified quantity of interest to be the same in the idealised population as in the real population. Idealised populations are based on unrealistic but convenient simplifications such as random mating, simultaneous birth of each new generation, constant population size, and equal numbers of children per parent. In some simple scenarios, the effective population size is the number of breeding individuals in the population. However, for most quantities of interest and most real populations, the census population size N of a real population is usually larger than the effective population size Ne

the same population may have multiple effective population sizes, for different properties of interest, including for different genetic loci.