<< Chapter < Page Chapter >> Page >

In the language of genetics, Mendel’s theory applied to humans says that if an individual receives two dominant alleles, one from each parent, the individual’s phenotype will express the dominant trait. If an individual receives two recessive alleles, then the recessive trait will be expressed in the phenotype. Individuals who have two identical alleles for a given gene, whether dominant or recessive, are said to be homozygous for that gene (homo- = “same”). Conversely, an individual who has one dominant allele and one recessive allele is said to be heterozygous for that gene (hetero- = “different” or “other”). In this case, the dominant trait will be expressed, and the individual will be phenotypically identical to an individual who possesses two dominant alleles for the trait.

It is common practice in genetics to use capital and lowercase letters to represent dominant and recessive alleles. Using Mendel’s pea plants as an example, if a tall pea plant is homozygous, it will possess two tall alleles ( TT ). A dwarf pea plant must be homozygous because its dwarfism can only be expressed when two recessive alleles are present ( tt ). A heterozygous pea plant ( Tt ) would be tall and phenotypically indistinguishable from a tall homozygous pea plant because of the dominant tall allele. Mendel deduced that a 3:1 ratio of dominant to recessive would be produced by the random segregation of heritable factors (genes) when crossing two heterozygous pea plants. In other words, for any given gene, parents are equally likely to pass down either one of their alleles to their offspring in a haploid gamete, and the result will be expressed in a dominant–recessive pattern if both parents are heterozygous for the trait.

Because of the random segregation of gametes, the laws of chance and probability come into play when predicting the likelihood of a given phenotype. Consider a cross between an individual with two dominant alleles for a trait ( AA ) and an individual with two recessive alleles for the same trait ( aa ). All of the parental gametes from the dominant individual would be A , and all of the parental gametes from the recessive individual would be a ( [link] ). All of the offspring of that second generation, inheriting one allele from each parent, would have the genotype Aa , and the probability of expressing the phenotype of the dominant allele would be 4 out of 4, or 100 percent.

This seems simple enough, but the inheritance pattern gets interesting when the second-generation Aa individuals are crossed. In this generation, 50 percent of each parent’s gametes are A and the other 50 percent are a . By Mendel’s principle of random segregation, the possible combinations of gametes that the offspring can receive are AA , Aa , aA (which is the same as Aa ), and aa . Because segregation and fertilization are random, each offspring has a 25 percent chance of receiving any of these combinations. Therefore, if an Aa × Aa cross were performed 1000 times, approximately 250 (25 percent) of the offspring would be AA ; 500 (50 percent) would be Aa (that is, Aa plus aA ); and 250 (25 percent) would be aa . The genotypic ratio for this inheritance pattern is 1:2:1. However, we have already established that AA and Aa (and aA ) individuals all express the dominant trait (i.e., share the same phenotype), and can therefore be combined into one group. The result is Mendel’s third-generation phenotype ratio of 3:1.

Get Jobilize Job Search Mobile App in your pocket Now!

Get it on Google Play Download on the App Store Now




Source:  OpenStax, Anatomy & Physiology. OpenStax CNX. Feb 04, 2016 Download for free at http://legacy.cnx.org/content/col11496/1.8
Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google Inc.

Notification Switch

Would you like to follow the 'Anatomy & Physiology' conversation and receive update notifications?

Ask