by R.

J Palacio
August was born with a face that looked so different because of one small change in his DNA that came from both of his parents. His sister Via, by chance, didnt inherit (or receive) this same change in her DNA, even though she and Auggie have the same parents. Science can predict how likely a child in the Pullman family could be born with Auggies condition. The four-square below is called a Punnett square. Scientists use these to figure out how likely children in a family will get different characteristics (like eye color or hair color). In the case of the Pullman family, the characteristic were talking about is a facial anomaly (or irregularity). Via explained (p105) that both of her parents carried the facial anomaly gene (or characteristic) in their DNA, but they were born with regular faces. To show this, lets use two letters for each of the Pullman parents Rr. The R stands for a regular face, while r stands for an irregular face. So, when the Pullman parents had children, the chances that one of their children would have a facial irregularity were slim.

Check this out

Dad
Inside the four-square there is

R
Mom

r
Rr

1 x RR (Regular face) 2 x Rr (Regular face) 1 x rr (irregular face)

R
r

RR Rr

rr

You only need one R to make a child with a regular face (which is the stronger characteristic), but you need two lowercase rs to make a child with an irregular face (which is the weaker characteristic).

**On the back are a few Punnett square problems similar to the one above.**

The rules you have to remember are

The uppercase letter is always the stronger characteristic you need at least one uppercase letter for the strong characteristic to show up. For example both RR and Rr are strong characteristics. The lowercase letter is always the weaker characteristic you always need two lowercase letters for the weaker characteristic to show up. For example, rr is the only weak characteristic.

1. Two peacocks at the zoo have a family of four chicks. The father has blue feathers and the mother has green feathers. The fathers blue feathers will be represented by BB and the mothers green feathers will be lowercase bb. What will each of the peacock chicks look like? Number of Blue feathered peacocks = Number of Green feathered peacocks =

2. One purple tiger and one orange tiger have family of cubs. The purple tiger is represented by Pp and the orange tiger is represented by lowercase pp. What will each of the cubs look like?

Number of Purple tigers =

Number of Orange tigers =

3. There are two zebras that have a family, but one of the parents has polka dots instead of stripes. If they have one child with polka dots, but the other three children are striped what two letters can we use for each parent? For stripes use the letter S and for polka dots use a lowercase s. Below are some Punnett squares to help you work it out.

Parent #1 is _____ _____

Parent #2 is _____ _____

*Special thanks to last years blue cluster students for helping create the above questions*

1. Two peacocks at the zoo have a family of four chicks. The father has blue feathers and the mother has green feathers. The fathers blue feathers will be represented by BB and the mothers green feathers will be lowercase bb. What will each of the peacock chicks look like?

B b b Bb Bb

B Bb Bb
Number of Blue feathered peacocks = 4 Number of Green feathered peacocks = 0

2. One purple tiger and one orange tiger have family of cubs. The purple tiger is represented by Pp and the orange tiger is represented by lowercase pp. What will each of the cubs look like?

P p p Pp Pp

p pp pp
Number of Purple tigers = 2 Number of Orange tigers = 2

3. There are two zebras that have a family, but one of the parents has polka dots instead of stripes. If they have one child with polka dots, but the other three children are striped what two letters can we use for each parent? For stripes use the letter S and for polka dots use a lowercase s. Below are some blank Punnett squares to help you work it out.

S S s SS Ss

s Ss ss
Parent #1 is __S___ __s___

Parent #2 is __S___ __s___