ANT 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Uniformitarianism, Genetic Distance, Sewall Wright
Document Summary
Gregor mendel: founder of genetics, discoverer of principles of inheritance. Genes on different chromosomes are independent of each other. Alleles that are responsible of traits are separated into reproductive cells (sperm/egg) in a process of meiosis and then randomly united during fertilization. Characteristics of children are passed down from parent to offspring: did experiment with pea plants with green/yellow colors and smooth/rough seeds. When pure green and yellow seeds were mated only yellow. When offspring were mated 1:3 ratio of green to yellow. Gametes carry single copies of parental chromosomes, so each parent provides only 1 particle. Particles are stretches of dna called genes or loci. Variants of genes are called alleles: genotype does not equal phenotype. Mendel thought this was true of all traits. Only traits on different chromosomes always segregate independently: genes on the same chromosome can be transmitted independently. Bits of one chromosome can be swapped between member of a chromosome pair.
