Mendel’s Legacy

Section 9.1
 Genetics- the field of biology devoted to
understanding how characteristics are
transmitted from parents to offspring

 Genetics was founded with the work of

Gregor Johann Mendel
Gregor Johann Mendel

 Austrian monk who experimented with garden

peas

 1842- age 21; entered a monastery in Brunn

 1851- entered the University of Vienna

 Heredity- the transmission of characteristics

from parents to offspring
Mendel’s garden peas

 Mendel observed 7 characteristics of pea

plants, each occurring in 2 contrasting traits.

 Traits- plant height (long or short stems),

flower position along stem (axial or terminal),
pod color (green or yellow) pod appearance
(inflated or constricted), seed texture (smooth or
wrinkled), & flower color (purple or white)
 Mendel collected seeds from his pea
plants

 He observed that both purple-flower and

white-flower plants grew from the seeds
of purple-flower plants
 He also observed that both tall and short
plants grew from seeds obtained from
tall plants

 Mendel wanted to find an explanation for

the variations
Mendel’s methods

 Mendel documented the traits of each

generation’s parents by controlling how much
the plants were pollinated

 Pollination- occurs when pollen grains

produced in the male reproductive parts of the
flower (anthers) are transferred to the female
reproductive part of the flower (stigma)
 Self-pollination- occurs when pollen is
transferred from the anthers of a flower to
either the stigma of the same flower or a
flower on the same plant

 Cross-pollination- involves flowers of 2

separate plants
 Self-pollination can be interrupted (and cross-
pollination performed) by removing the anthers
from a flower and manually transferring the
anther to the stigma of another plant

 By doing this, Mendel was able to protect his

flowers from receiving pollen that might be
transferred by wind or insects, giving him more
control over the pollination of his pea plants
Mendel’s experiments

 Plants that are pure for a trait always

produce offspring with that trait

 strain- denotes plants that are pure for a

trait

 P1 generation- each parental generation

 F1 generation- the first filial generation

 F2 generation- the second filial

generation
 Mendel’s Crosses & Results
P cross F1 generation F2 generation Actual ratio Probability ratio
Axial X Terminal = Axial 651 axial 3.14:1 3:1
207 terminal
Tall X Short = tall 787 tall 2.84:1 3:1
277 short
Inflated X inflated 882 inflated 2.95:1 3:1
Constricted = 299 cons.
Green X yellow = green 428 green 2.82:1 3:1
(pods) 152 yellow
Smooth X smooth 5,474 sm. 2.96:1 3:1
Wrinkled = 1,850 wrink.
Yellow X Green = yellow 6,022 yellow 3.01:1 3:1
(seeds) 2,001 green
Purple X White = purple 705 purple 3.15:1 3:1
224 white
Recessive & Dominant
traits
 Dominant factor- dominates the other
factor of a specific characteristic

 Recessive factor- the trait that did not

appear in the F1 generation but
reappeared in the F2 generation
Law of segregation

 States that a pair of factors is

segregated, or separated, during the
formation of gametes.
Law of independent
assortment
 States that factors for different
characteristics are distributed to gametes
independently.
Chromosomes & Genes

 Molecular genetics- the study of the

structure and function of chromosomes
and genes

 Allele- each of several alternatives of a

gene (Mendel's factors are now called
alleles.)