Step 1: Understanding the Concept:
Genetic diversity within a population is governed by four primary evolutionary forces: mutation, gene flow (migration), natural selection, and genetic drift.
Step 2: Detailed Explanation:
- Mutation is the ultimate source of all genetic variation, continuously creating new alleles.
- Gene flow (or gene migration) introduces new alleles or genetic variants into a population from other populations.
- Together, mutation and gene flow always act to increase (improve) genetic diversity within a population.
- In contrast, Natural selection and Genetic drift generally filter out alleles or cause random loss of alleles, reducing the genetic diversity within a population over time.
Step 3: Final Answer:
Therefore, the combination of gene flow and mutation always improves genetic diversity.