Abstract
AFTER the work of Haldane1 and Muller2, much has been written about the genetic load caused by mutation. This mutational load had been defined as the fraction by which the mean fitness of a population subject to mutation differs from the fitness of the wild (non-mutant) genotype3. The operational definition of load is then 
where Wmax is the fitness of the non-mutant genotype, and W̄ the mean fitness of the population subject to mutation.
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References
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CLARKE, B. The Effect of Mutation on Population Size. Nature 242, 196–197 (1973). https://doi.org/10.1038/242196a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/242196a0
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