Joshua Dobbins

Mary Delany-Hudzik
Biology 2: Concepts in Genetics
9/11/2014
Homework Set #1

1. In a particular strain of mice, certain individuals display a phenotype called
short tail, which is inherited as a dominant trait. Some individuals display a
recessive trait called dilute, which affects coat color. Which of these traits would
be easier to eliminate from the population by selective breeding? Why?

It would be easier to eliminate the dilute coat color from the population through
selective breeding. In order for a dominant trait such as the short tail to appear, the
genotype must either be homozygous dominant or heterozygous. In order for a recessive
trait such as the dilute coat color to appear, the individual must be homozygous
recessive. Because the dilute coat color only appears when there are two recessive
genes, it would be very simple to eliminate it just by introducing a dominant allele; this
would change the phenotype and eventually eliminate this phenotype.

2. As a Drosophila geneticist, you keep stocks of flies of specific genotypes. You have
a fly that has normal wings (dominant phenotype). Flies with short wings are
homozygous for a recessive allele of the wing-length gene. You need to know if this
fly with normal wings is pure breeding or heterozygous for the wing-length trait.
What cross would you do to determine the genotype, and what results would you
expect for each possible genotype?

When attempting to discern the genotype of the normal winged fly, a test cross between
this fly and a homozygous recessive (short winged) fly would be necessary. If the
selected normal winged fly was pure breeding, then each of the offspring would be
heterozygous, having normal wings. If the subject Drosophila was heterozygous, then the
genotype would appear in a 1/2 Ww (heterozygous) : 1/2 ww (homozygous recessive)
ratio

3. In squash an allele for white color (W) is dominant over the allele for yellow color
(w). Give the genotypic and phenotypic ratios for the results of each of the following
crosses:
W/W X w/w
W/w X w/w
W/w X W/w
WW X ww: Genotype: 1 Ww (heterozygous)
Phenotype: 1 White
Ww X ww: Genotype: Ww (heterozygous) : ww (homozygous recessive)
Phenotype: 1 white : 1 yellow
Ww X Ww: Genotype: WW (homozygous dominant) : Ww (heterozygous) :
ww (homozygous recessive)
Phenotype: white : yellow
4. In human beings, brown eyes are dominant over blue eyes. Suppose a blue-eyed
man marries a brown-eyed woman whose father was blue-eyed. What proportion of
their children would you predict will have blue eyes?

Blue-eyed man: bb
Brown-eyed woman: Bb
When these two individuals mate, their offspring should exhibit a proportion of Bb
(heterozygous) : bb (homozygous recessive). This means that half of their offspring
should have brown eyes and half should have blue eyes.

5. In peas an allele for tall plants (T) is dominant over the allele for short plants (t).
An allele of another independent gene produces smooth peas (S) and is dominant
over the allele for wrinkled peas (s). Calculate both phenotypic ratios and genotypic
ratios for the results of each of the following crosses:
T/t S/s T/t S/s
T/t s/s t/t s/s
t/t S/s T/t s/s
T/T s/s t/t S/S

TtSs X TtSs TS; Ts; tS; ts X TS; Ts; tS; ts
TTSS, TTSs, TtSS, TtSs
TTSs, TTss, TtSs, Ttss
TtSS, TtSs, ttSS, ttSs
TtSs, Ttss, ttSs, ttss
Genotypes: 1 TTSS : 2 TTSs : 2 TtSS : 4 TtSs : 1 TTss : 2 Ttss : 1 ttSS : 2 ttSs : 1 ttss
Phenotypes: 9 tall, smooth : 3 tall, wrinkled : 3 short, wrinkled : 1 short, wrinkled

Ttss X ttss Ts; ts X ts
Ttss, ttss
Genotypes: 1 Ttss : 1 ttss
Phenotypes: 1 tall, wrinkled : 1 short, wrinkled

ttSs X Ttss tS; ts X Ts; ts
TtSs, ttSs
Ttss, ttss
Genotypes: 1 TtSs : 1 ttSs : 1 Ttss : 1 ttss
Phenotypes: 1 tall, smooth : 1 short, smooth : 1 tall, wrinkled : 1 short, wrinkled

TTss X ttSS Ts X tS
TtSs
Genotype: 1TtSs
Phenotype: Tall, smooth




6. A third-grader decided to breed guinea pigs for her school science project. She
went to a pet store and bought a male with smooth black fur and a female with
rough white fur. She wanted to study the inheritance of those features and was sorry
to see that the first litter of eight contained only rough black animals. To her
disappointment, the second litter from those same parents contained seven rough
black animals. Soon the first litter had begun to produce F2 offspring, and they
showed a variety of coat types. Before long, the child had 125 F2 guinea pigs. Eight
of them had smooth white coats, 25 had smooth black coats, 23 were rough and
white, and 69 were rough and black.

a. How are the coat color and texture characteristics inherited? What evidence
supports your conclusions?

Obviously, the coat color was inherited from the father and the coat texture was inherited
from the mother. Apparently both parents contained one set of homozygous dominant
alleles and one set of homozygous recessive alleles. This is evident when seeing that the
F
1
generation only contained black, rough guinea pigs (meaning theyre all heterozygous)

b. What phenotypes and proportions of offspring should the girl expect if she mates
one of the smooth white F2 females to an F1 male?

Smooth and white are both homozygous recessive traits (bbrr) while the whole F
1

generation is heterozygous (BbRr).
br X BR, Br, bR, br
Genotypes: 1 BbRr : 1 Bbrr : 1 bbRr : 1 bbrr
Phenotypes: 1 black, rough : 1 Back, smooth : 1 white, rough : 1 white, smooth

7. The following chart shows the results of different matings between jimsonweed
plants that had either purple or white flowers and spiny or smooth pods.
Offspring Phenotypes
Cross Parents

Purple, Spiny White, Spiny Purple,
Smooth
White,
Smooth
A purple spiny
X purple spiny
94 32 28 11
B purple spiny
X purple
smooth
40 0 38 0
C purple spiny
X white spiny
34 30 0 0
D purple spiny
X white spiny
89 92 31 27
E purple
smooth X
purple smooth
0 0 36 11
F white spiny X
white spiny
0 45 0 16
a. Determine the dominant allele for the two traits.
Dominant Alleles: Purple and Spiny

b. What are the genotypes of the two parents for each of the crosses in the table
above? (hint: there could be more than one possible genotype)
Cross Parents
A purple spiny X purple spiny (PpSs) X (PpSs)

B purple spiny X purple smooth (PPSS X PPSS), (PPSS X PpSs),
(PPSS X PPSs), (PPSS X PpSS)

C purple spiny X white spiny (PpSS X ppSS), (PpSs X ppSS),
(PpSS X ppSs)

D purple spiny X white spiny (PpSs X ppSs)

E purple smooth X purple smooth (Ppss X Ppss)

F white spiny X white spiny (ppSs X ppSs)

8. A young couple went to see a genetic counselor because each had a sibling affected
with cystic fibrosis (CF). (CF is a recessive disease, and neither member of the
couple nor any of their four parents is affected.)

a. What is the probability that the female of this couple is a carrier?

Cc X Cc CC, Cc, Cc, cc
There is a 2/3 chance that the female is a carrier of CF.

b. What are the chances that their child will be affected with cystic fibrosis?

2/3 (chance of being carrier) * 2/3 (chance of being carrier) = 4/9 (chance both carriers)
4/9 (chance both carriers) * 1/4 (chance of homozygous recessive) = 4/36
= 1/9 (chance of being affected)

c. What is the probability that their child will not be affected with cystic fibrosis but
will be a carrier of the cystic fibrosis mutation?

2/3 * 2/3 * 1/2 = 2/9
2/3 * 1/3 * 1/2 = 1/9
1/3 * 2/3 * 1/2 = 1/9
2/9 + 1/9 + 1/9
= 4/9 (chance of carrier)