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Incomplete Dominance

Incomplete Dominance

Gregor Mendel's work (1822 - 1884) was primarily focused on pea plants. Through his initial experiments, he determined that every gene in a diploid cell has two variants called alleles inherited from each parent. He suggested that amongst these two alleles, one allele is dominant in character and the other recessive. The combination of alleles determines the phenotype of a gene in an organism.

Dihybrid Crosses

Dihybrid Crosses

Law of Segregation

Law of Segregation

When crossing pea plants, Mendel noticed that one of the parental traits would sometimes disappear in the first generation of offspring, called the F1 generation, and could reappear in the next generation (F2). He concluded that one of the traits must be dominant over the other, thereby causing masking of one trait in the F1 generation. When he crossed the F1 plants, he found that 75% of the offspring in the F2 generation had the dominant phenotype, while 25% had the recessive phenotype.

Hardy-Weinberg Principle

Hardy-Weinberg Principle

Diploid organisms have two alleles of each gene, one from each parent, in their somatic cells. Therefore, each individual contributes two alleles to the gene pool of the population. The gene pool of a population is the sum of every allele of all genes within that population and has some degree of variation. Genetic variation is typically expressed as a relative frequency, which is the percentage of the total population that has a given allele, genotype or phenotype.

Law of Independent Assortment

Law of Independent Assortment

While Mendel’s Law of Segregation states that the two alleles for one gene are separated into different gametes, a different question of how different genes are inherited remains. For example, is the gene for tall plants inherited with the gene for green peas? Mendel asked this question by experimenting with a dihybrid cross; a cross in which both parents are homozygous for two distinct traits resulting in an F1 generation that are heterozygous for both traits.

Chi-square Analysis

Chi-square Analysis

The chi-square test is a statistical hypothesis test. It is used to check whether there is a significant difference between an expected value and an observed value. In the context of genetics, it enables us to either accept or reject a hypothesis, based on how much the observed values deviate from the expected values.
The chi-square test was developed by Pearson in 1990.
The first step of performing a Chi-square analysis is to establish a null hypothesis, which assumes that there is no real...

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Frequency and Distribution of Crossovers in Caenorhabditis elegans Meiosis by SNP Genotyping using Real-time PCR

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Quantitative inheritance and divergence inDrosophila populations.

D L Palenzona¹, M L Vanelli, G Rocchetta

¹Institute of Genetics, University of Bologna, Italy.

TAG. Theoretical and Applied Genetics. Theoretische Und Angewandte Genetik

|January 16, 2014

Summary

Relaxing artificial selection on Drosophila melanogaster wing length revealed divergent sub-populations. Initial phenotypic variability influenced responses, suggesting complex genetic interactions beyond simple additive models.

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Area of Science:

Evolutionary biology
Developmental genetics
Population genetics

Background:

Artificial selection experiments are crucial for understanding evolutionary mechanisms.
Drosophila melanogaster is a key model organism for genetic studies.
Understanding the genetic basis of phenotypic variation is fundamental.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the genetic basis of divergence in Drosophila melanogaster following relaxation of artificial selection for short wing.
To explore the role of initial phenotypic variability in differential responses to selection.
To examine the genetic architecture underlying developmental processes influencing wing morphology.

Main Methods:

Relaxation of artificial selection for short wing in Drosophila melanogaster.
Reciprocal crosses between vestigial and wild-type heterozygotes.
Phenotypic variability assessment in sub-lines.
Reproductive fitness assays.

Main Results:

Divergent sub-populations emerged after relaxing selection, with responses varying based on prior selection procedures.
Reciprocal crosses within selection lines revealed divergence.
Initial differences in phenotypic variability correlated with differential responses to natural selection.
No significant differences in reproductive fitness were observed between divergent lines.

Conclusions:

The observed divergence is not easily explained by a simple additive polygenic model, suggesting complex genetic interactions.
Developmental processes appear to be influenced by complex genetic factors.
Specific factors within the FM line likely contribute to the observed divergence.