Inheritance

Question 1

Who was Gregor Mendel?

Answer 1

He was a monk from Austria who studied inheritance in garden pea plants. Born in 1843 and is called the father of genetics.

Question 2

What is pollen?

Answer 2

Tiny granules that contain the male sex cell of seed plants.

Question 3

What are eggs?

Answer 3

A sex cell that is produced by the female.

Question 4

What is the ovule

Answer 4

Where the eggs are located in the flower.

Question 5

What is pollination

Answer 5

The process where pollen is transferred from the male reproductive structures to the female structures of seed plants.

Question 6

What are self pollinating plants?

Answer 6

Plants that have both male and female reproductive structures and can transfer its own pollen to its own ovule.

Question 7

What are true breeding plants.

Answer 7

Plants that always have offspring that have the same traits.

Question 8

What is cross pollination.

Answer 8

Cross Pollination is when pollen from one plant fertilizes the ovule of a flower on a different plant.Pollen can be carried by the wind or animals like birds or insects.

Question 9

Define characteristics

Answer 9

A feature that has different forms.

Question 10

Define traits.

Answer 10

The different forms of characteristics.

Question 11

What are genes.

Answer 11

Genes are are the instructions for inherited traits.

Question 12

Define alleles.

Answer 12

The different forms of a gene are called alleles. Offspring have 2 alleles for every trait. These alleles can be dominant (big letter) or recessive (lowercase letter

Question 13

What is phenotype

Answer 13

Phenotype is how that characteristic looks in the organism.

Question 14

What is genotype

Answer 14

Genotype is shows the combinations of alleles.

Question 15

Define homozygous

Answer 15

Homozygous is the term used when both alleles are the same like pp or PP.

Question 16

Define heterozygous

Answer 16

The term used when two alleles are different like,Pp

Question 17

Describe punnet squares.

Answer 17

Punnet squares are used to organize all the possible combinations of offspring from two parents. They show the probability or the mathematical chance that something will happen. (Every event is independent of the event that came before it)

Question 18

Describe Mendel’s first experiment .

Answer 18

Mendel studied 7 different characteristics . He crossed true breeding plants together. He called the offspring the first generation.

Question 19

What is a dominant trait?

Answer 19

The trait that always appeared in each cross. For example, if he crossed purple and white flowers he always got purple .

Question 20

What is a recessive trait?

Answer 20

A trait that seems to disappear or recede(to back off).

Question 21

What happened in Mendel’s second experiment .

Answer 21

He allowed the first generation flowers to self pollinate . He saw that the recessive trait seemed to appear in the second generation . He calculated the ratios of dominant to recessive traits and realized that each plant must carry two sets of instructions for each characteristic.