The Hatch Act of 1872, authorized ___ in states with Land Grant colleges. The purpose was to create new knowledge by using what has to be known as the

not necessarily. higher fitness requires the organism to be reproductive successful. for example, an organism at age 10 with 15 offspring is much more fit than an organism at age 15 with only 5 offspring.

the last one: artificial selection/genetic engineering

plant breeding is modifying the genetic composition of the plant - but this isn't cloning (which is specifically introducing a gene into a genome). but you are artificially selecting for the phenotype that you want.

the second one is literally genetic engineering - the gene would have been cloned first and then inserted or genetically engineered into the new plant cell (the cotton).