Genetic Analysis Fall 2021 Midterm Problem Set 120 points

1. A diploid somatic cell from a rodent has a diploid number of 42 chromosomes (2n = 42).
What is the total number of chromosomes present in each of the final products of meiosis in
this rodent? 5 pts
23 chromosomes
2. a. In the genetic code, how many possible unique codons are there? 5 pts
64
b. An alien life form is discovered on an asteroid retrieved by the International Space
Station. The DNA of this species has the bases P and Q (two bases only) but uses the same
20 amino acids that life forms use on Earth. How many bases must make up a codon in order
to specify all 20 amino acids? 5 pts Show your work
5 bases needed to make up 20 codons because 5P2=20

3. For alleles (one dominant, one recessive) at three independently assorting loci, a cross
between two heterozygous individuals will produce how many different genotypes among the
offspring? (note, this is a trihybrid cross) 5 pts Show your work

4. In corn, a tall plant that produces purple kernels is crossed with a short plant that produces
white kernels. Tall is dominant to short and purple is dominant to white. This cross yields
120 tall, purple kernel plants, 116 short, white kernel plants, 119 tall, white kernel plants, and
113 short, purple kernel plants. What are the genotypes of the tall, purple kernel parent and
the short, white kernel parent? (Gene symbols for height are “T” and “t”; gene symbols for
color are “P” and “p”.) 5 pts
We can see that the ratio is almost 1:1:1:1, so it must be a heterozygous (T/t; P/p) parents

5. The pedigree below shows individual II-2 affected with an autosomal recessive disease.
Let “A” represent the dominant allele and let “a” represent the recessive allele.

What is the probability that individual II-1 is a carrier of the disease allele? 5 pts
Sine II-2 is affect individual while parents are not, the parent must be Aa X Aa. So,
probability of Aa is 1/2 for II-1
6. floppy (f), welt (w), and lefty (l) represent mutant phenotypes in snapdragons. f+/f+
w+/w+ l+/l+ is crossed with f/f w/w l/l. The F1 plant is testcrossed and the following progeny
are produced (all mutant traits are recessive to their wildtype counterparts). What is the order
of these genes on the chromosome and what are the distances between them in map units?
Show your work (i.e. the logic and calculations used to make the map). 25 pts
Progeny phenotypes Numbers
f/f w/w l+/l 87
f+/f w+/w l/l 94
f+/f w+/w l+/l 3,479
f/f w/w l/l 3,478
f+/f w/w l+/l 1,515
f/f w+/w l/l 1,531
f/f w+/w l+/l 292
f+/f w/w l/l 280

7. The following cross is performed using Neurospora crassa:

HIS DX fus X his dx FUS
The resulting diploid then goes through meiosis to produce the following meiotic products (tetrads are
shown for simplicity). Their numbers are shown below each class of tetrad.

HIS dx FUS his dx fus HIS dx FUS HIS dx fus

HIS dx FUS HIS dx FUS HIS dx fus HIS dx fus
his dx fus his dx fus his dx FUS his dx FUS
his dx fus HIS dx FUS his dx fus his dx FUS
NPD NPD T PD
212 15 174 215

HIS dx FUS his dx FUS his dx FUS

his dx FUS HIS dx fus HIS dx fus
HIS dx fus his dx FUS HIS dx FUS
his dx fus HIS dx fus his dx fus
T PD T
57 12 15

a. Which parent is the female parent? Explain how you know this. 5 pts
Neurospora’s two mating types (MAT-A and MAT-b, regarded as sexes)’s cell wall and
nucleus fuse together when they meet, so the there is no exact determination for female
parent.
b. Produce a map of these three loci. Include the centromere(s) in your map. 20 pts
8. In chilli peppers, there are two alleles that affect stem color. The “P” allele corresponds to
purple and the “p” allele corresponds to green. The following crosses are performed yielding
the corresponding offspring proportions:
parental phenotypes offspring phenotypes
1. purple x green 422 purple, 417 green
2. purple x purple 426 purple, 135 green
3. purple x green 953 purple, 0 green
4. purple x green 404 purple, 397 green

a. What are the genotypes of the parents in cross 1? 5 pts

Both homozygous (PP X pp)
b. What are the genotypes of the parents in cross 3? 5 pts
Both heterozygous (Pp X Pp)
9. a. The pedigree in the figure below shows the transmission of a trait in a particular family. Based
on this pattern, what is the most likely mode of inheritance? 5 pts Sex-linked inheritance

1 2

4
b. What is the genotype of individual 1? 5 pts
XaY
c. What is the genotype of individual 3? 5 pts
XaXa

11. For the following meiotic crossover event in Neurospora crassa, please draw the
arrangement of the four meiotic products in the tetrad (there is more than one possible
answer) 5 pts
 A B

A B
a b

a b

AB
Ab
aB
ab
12. Two haploid yeast strains are crossed to generate a diploid. One of the strains is wild
type while the other strain has a defect and grows slowly.
WT X slow
The resulting diploid strain is phenotypically wild type. The diploid is induced to produce
spores by meiosis and the following tetrads result:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
WT WT WT WT WT WT WT WT
WT WT WT WT WT WT WT WT
WT WT WT WT WT WT WT slow
WT WT WT WT WT WT WT WT
Please provide a genetic explanation for why tetrad 8 is different from all of the other tetrads.
Use a diagram if necessary. 10 pts
It is a result of MII segregation pattern. If the alleles for slow is a smaller proporation
compared to MT, during the segration, the smaller proportion of slow will be represented in
the 4 haploid daughter cells.