Gregor Mendel and Principles of Heredity Quiz

Study Notes

John Gregor Mendel, an Austrian monk, discovered the principles of heredity through experiments with pea plants.
Mendel used pea plants due to their distinct heritable characters, short generation time, and ease of controlled mating.
Mendel's experiments involved self-pollination and cross-pollination (hybridization) between true breeding parent plants with contrasting characteristics.
Self-pollination produces offspring with the same traits as the parent, called true breeding plants.
Cross-pollination results in offspring with a mix of traits from both parents, called hybrids.
The F1 generation (hybrids) undergoes self-pollination or cross-pollination to produce the F2 generation.
The F2 generation exhibits a 3:1 phenotypic ratio of dominant to recessive traits.
Mendel's observations led to the laws of segregation and independent assortment.
The law of segregation states that alleles for a gene separate during gamete formation, leading to different gametes carrying each allele.
The law of independent assortment states that alleles for different genes assort independently during gamete formation.
Pea plants have both male (stamen) and female (carpel) reproductive organs.
Mendel performed controlled breeding experiments to derive the laws of inheritance.
The Punnett square is a tool used to predict the possible genotypes and phenotypes from a genetic cross.
A test cross is used to determine the genotype of an individual with a dominant phenotype by breeding it with a homozygous recessive individual.
A dihybrid is an organism heterozygous for two genes controlling two different characters.
During a dihybrid cross, gametes carrying different alleles for each gene are produced and assort independently.
The F2 generation of a dihybrid cross exhibits a 9:3:3:1 phenotypic ratio.- During meiosis, non-homologous chromosomes form two possible combinations at the metaphase plate after homologous chromosomes align.
Law of segregation is applied during anaphase 1 of meiosis 1, resulting in each allele of a gene separating and going to distinct daughter cells.
Each daughter cell receives unique combinations of alleles for different genes, leading to formation of genetically diverse gametes.
Fertilization of gametes from the F1 generation produces the F2 generation, exhibiting a phenotypic ratio of 9:3:3:1.
Recombination occurs during fertilization, randomly combining alleles from each gene, resulting in new phenotypes in the F2 generation that differ from both parents and F1 generation.

Description

Test your knowledge on the experiments and principles of heredity discovered by Gregor Mendel through pea plant genetics. Learn about self-pollination, cross-pollination, Punnett squares, dihybrid crosses, and the laws of segregation and independent assortment.