Panmixia

Panmixia (or panmixis) means random mating.

A panmictic population is one where all individuals are potential partners. This assumes that there are no mating restrictions, neither genetic nor behavioural, upon the population, and that therefore all recombination is possible. The Wahlund effect assumes that the overall population is panmictic.

In genetics, random mating involves the mating of individuals regardless of any physical, genetic, or social preference. In other words, the mating between two organisms is not influenced by any environmental, hereditary, or social interaction. Hence, potential mates have an equal chance of being selected. Random mating is a factor assumed in the Hardy-Weinberg principle and is distinct from lack of natural selection: in viability selection for instance, selection occurs before mating.

Description

In simpler terms, it is the ability of individuals in a population to move about freely within their habitat, possibly over a range of hundreds to thousands of miles, and thus breed with other members of the population that defines panmixia (or panmicticism).