CAPITOL UNIVERSITY

Cagayan de Oro City

SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL

LESSON PACKET

SUBJECT: General Biology 2

ESSENTIAL TOPICS: Laws of Inheritance and Modifications on Mendel’s LESSON CODE: W7L1
Classic Ratios
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

1) Predict genotypes and phenotypes of parents and offspring using laws of

inheritance

DISCUSSION

MENDEL’S LAWS OF INHERITANCE

A. THE LAW OF SEGREGATION
 This law describes what happens to the alleles during the formation of gametes
 According to this law, an individual has a pair of alleles for each trait. During gamete
formation, the alleles in the pair separate, such that each gamete receives only one allele for
the trait.
 B. THE LAW OF INDEPENDENT ASSORTMENT
 This law states that alleles segregate independently during the formation of gamete. The
genes do not influence one another on how they are sorted.
 This law can be represented by Mendel’s dihybrid experiment
 As a result of the experiment, he found out that the members of the F2 generation have phenotypes not
found in the F1 plants

C. THE LAW OF DOMINANCE

 A trait is said to be dominant if it is expressed in spite of the presence of another allele
 It states that some alleles are dominant, whereas others are recessive
 An organism with a dominant allele for a certain trait will always express that trait. However, an organism
with a recessive allele for a particular trait will express that trait only if the dominant allele is NOT present
MODIFICATIONS ON MENDEL’S CLASSIC RATIOS

 Not all patterns of inheritance can be described using Mendel’s laws. Sometimes, inheritance
patterns are more complicated than simple dominance.
 Not all offspring express purely dominant and recessive alleles. Some offspring with heterozygous traits express
traits that are intermediate between the traits of their homozygous parents.
 There are also alleles that are both expressed in the organism.
 Some individuals may also have genes that contain more than two alleles.
 These modes of inheritance are sometimes called non-Mendelian genetics.

A. INCOMPLETE DOMINANCE
 Happens when one allele is not completely dominant over the other allele
 Incomplete dominance often shows a heterozygous phenotype that is intermediate between the two
homozygous phenotypes.
 This means that the traits have blended in the offspring
 EXAMPLES: A cross between two four-o’clock plants Mirabilis shows an interesting result. If a red-
flowered (RR) plant is crossed with a white-flowered (rr) plant, the resulting offspring are pink (Rr)
plants.
B. CODOMINANCE
 Both alleles contribute to the phenotype of an organism
 EXAMPLES: In cattle, the allele for red hair (R) is codominant with the allele for white (W) hair. If both
alleles were present in the offspring, a roan or pinkish-brown appearance shows (RW). Roan is basically a
combination of both the red and the white hairs.
 C. MULTIPLE ALLELES
 This type of inheritance involves more than two phenotypes for a particular trait, which
happens when an organism has more than two alleles for the trait.
 You‘d be able to observe a mixture of dominant alleles
 EXAMPLES: The coat color in rabbits can be determined using four different alleles. These four alleles can
be combined in different ways.

 Another good example of multiple alleles is seen in the human blood type. Humans have four different
blood types: A, B, AB, and O
 The different alleles can have these possible genotypes and phenotypes

References:
 DIWA Senior High School Series: General Biology 2

END