Mendel and Mendelian

Genetics

 Gregor Mendel 1822-1884

 Published his findings in 1865
Quick Review
Review (continued)
Still Review
Mendel
 Considered the
father of modern
genetics
 Studied inheritance
of pea plants
 Said that inheritance
followed certain laws.
 His laws were not
well accepted at first.
Why Pea Plants?
 Mendel used pea
plants in his
experiments largely
because of their
ability to self
pollinate.
Mendel’s laws of
inheritance
 Mendel came up with
two major laws of
inheritance:
 The law of
segregation (4 parts)
 The law of
independent
assortment.
Law of Segregation
 There are four parts to this law
1) There are alternate versions of genes called
alleles.
2) For each characteristic, an organism inherits two
alleles.
3) Alleles interact in a number of ways. (dominance,
incomplete dominance, codominance)
4) The two alleles for a trait separate during gamete
production
Law of independent
assortment
 This law states the
inheritance of one
trait will not affect the
inheritance of
another.
 This is only true for
traits that are not
linked.
The importance of Mendel

 Why is Mendel’s work so important?

 Before his time no one took the time to
figure out how traits were passed on.
 Mendel’s work laid the basic framework for
other scientists to build on.
After Mendel

 Mendel’s work was rediscovered in 1900.

 Other scientists started to add to his
ideas to build the current model of
genetics as we know it.
 This is called classical genetics.
Crosses
 Heterozygote:
contains both types
of alleles for a trait.
(Aa)
 Homozygous:
contains only one
allele for a trait (AA
or aa)
 Generations are
labeled as F#
Monohybrid vs Dihybrid
 Monohybrid = Aa X
Aa
 Dihybrid = AaBb X
AaBb
 Law of independent
assortment says that
the inheritance of A
will not effect B.
http://www.biology.arizona.edu/mendelian_genetics/mendelian_genetics.html