MENDELIAN GENETICS

By: Hyke Maybay David Portalibre Maria JC Loreme Vale Momblan (Grade 8 STE, Tigbauan NHS, Tigbauan, Iloilo)

Introduction
When organisms create offspring, they give
rise to living things that exhibit likeness to, as well as
variation from them. How is this possible?

When the plants from the F1 generation were

crossed with each other or self-pollinated, the
offspring (F2 or second filial generation) were of
two types.

Objectives

recognize Mendels work that provided the

foundation for the science of genetics
illustrate Mendelian principles of inheritance
predict the outcome of a monohybrid and
dihybrid cross
explain how heredity determine the traits of an
organism

Principles of Heredity
Gregor Mendel was an Augustinian monk in
a monastery in Brnn, Austria-Hungarian Empire
(now Brno, Czech Republic). He is also known as
the father of genetics for discovering the principles
of heredity.

Based on his results, there were factors in the

plants which controlled the appearance of a trait,
called genes.
Since two alternative expressions of a trait
were possible, he hypothesized that traits were
controlled by a pair of genes, now called alleles.
Mendels First Hypothesis

Mendels objectives:

to investigate how individual traits are

inherited
to find out whether both parents contributed
equally to the traits of the offspring
to know if the traits present in the offspring
were produced by the blending of the traits of
the parents

Mendel chose the garden pea (Pisum sativum)

for his experiments. Before he started his
experiments, Mendel first produced pure-breeding
plants. Mendel allowed his pea plants to selfpollinate for many generations until all the offspring
had the same features as the parents, generation
after generation.

In every organism, there is a pair of

factors which controls the appearance of a
particular trait.

Based on the results for the F1 generation,

the trait for round seeds, which appears, is the
dominant trait. While the trait of wrinkled seeds,
which did not appear, is the recessive trait.
A dominant trait like round seed, for example,
is represented by letter R and a recessive trait like
wrinkled seed is represented by a small letter r.
Since genes occur in pairs, a pure-breeding roundseed plant is symbolized as RR and pure-breeding
wrinkled-seed pea plant as rr.

When he has pure-breeding plants, Mendel

began cross-pollinating peas with contrasting traits.
The pure-breeding peas constituted the parental or
P1 generation.
The offspring of the parental cross are called the
first filial (F1) generation, also called hybrids.

Principle of Dominance
The dominant trait dominates or
prevents the expression of the recessive trait.

Before Mendels time, it was believed that all

traits become mixed when they are transmitted from
generation to generation, as red and blue paints mix
to give a violet color. However, when Mendel
crossed pure-breeding pea plants, the pea plants did
not produce offspring with blended or intermediate
traits.

A.2) Using the Punnet Square

Mendels crosses can be recorded in a chart
called a Punnett square. The Punnett square helps
us to predict the outcome of a given cross. It allows
us to determine the possible combinations of genes
in a cross.
Two hybrid round-seeded peas are crossed.

Law of Segregation
The pair of genes segregate or
separate from each other during gamete
formation.

B. Dihybrid Cross
Hybrid round, yellow seeds are crossed

Genotypes and Phenotypes

Genotype is the genetic makeup of an individual;
represented by two letters. (ex. RR, Rr, rr)
Phenotype is the expression of the genes in an
individual. (ex. round, wrinkled)
Homozygous genotypes - if both alleles for a
trait are the same.
Heterozygous genotypes - if the two alleles for
a trait are different.

Hybrid Cross
A. Monohybrid Cross one trait is being crossed
A.1) Using the Forked-line method
A pure tall plant is crossed with the same species
that is pure short find the genotypic ratio and the
phenotypic ratio.

Using the Punnet square.

RY

Ry

rY

ry

RY

RRYY

RRYy

RrYY

RrYy

Ry

RRYy

RRyy

RrYy

Rryy

rY

RrYY

RrYy

rrYY

rrYy

ry

RrYy

Rryy

rrYy

rryy

Law of Independent Assortment

Genotypic ratio 100% Tt (Hybrid Tall)

Phenotypic ratio 100% tall

The distribution or assortment of

one pair of factors is independent of the
distribution of the other pair.