A population with non-linked, recessive alleles of a gene, where an individual who has two copies of the recessive allele and is therefore homozygous is dead, while an individual who has only one copy of it, and one copy of a different allele (and is heterozygous) survives.

From the BioTech Dictionary at http://biotech.icmb.utexas.edu/. For further information see the BioTech homenode.