Selective Pressure

The influence exerted by some factor (such as an antibiotic) on natural selection to promote one group of organisms over another. In the case of antibiotic resistance, antibiotics cause a selective pressure by killing susceptible bacteria, allowing antibiotic-resistant bacteria to survive and multiply.

Selection pressure can be regarded as a force that causes a particular organism to evolve in a certain direction. Organisms have many different phenotypes, or observable characteristics, many are neutral.A selective pressure is any reason for organisms with certain phenotypes to have either a survival benefit or disadvantage.Selective pressures leads natural selection.

Related Journals of Selective Pressure

Clinical Microbiology: Open Access, Cellular Microbiology, Open Microbiology Journal, Molecular Microbiology, Journal of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology.