Select the correct answers to the questions from the given options. (Do not copy the questions, write the correct answer only.)
Industrial melanism was observed in:
Topic: Industrial melanism
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Answer
(b) Peppered moth.
The PEPPERED MOTH (Biston betularia) is the classic example.
Before industrialisation, English tree trunks were pale with lichen; the light moths were camouflaged and the dark (melanic) forms were easily seen and eaten. Soot then killed the lichen and blackened the trunks, reversing the advantage, and within decades the dark form had become the common one in industrial areas.
THE POINT: the moths did not change to suit their surroundings. Both forms already existed, and the changed environment altered WHICH ONE SURVIVED to breed. That is natural selection.
Option (a) MICE is the deliberate distractor, because mice are famous in a DIFFERENT experiment — Weismann cutting their tails for 22 generations to disprove the inheritance of acquired characters, which the 2025 paper tests. Two experiments, two animals; keep them apart.
Peppered moth.