HEREDITY AND EVOLUTIO | Topic1| ACCUMULATION OF VARIATION DURING REPRODUCTION Heredity can be defined as resemblances among individuals related by descent or the transmission ‘of traits from parents to the offeprings. It means continuity of features from one generation to the next. ‘Variation is defined as the occurrence of differences in the characters (or traits) among the individuals. In a number of sexually reproducing animals, including human beings, quite distinct variations are visible among different individuals. The long term ‘accumulation of variations may lead to gradual ‘changes in the form or functions of organisms and ‘may even lead to the formation of a new species over ‘time. This process is known as evolution. In case an organism reproduces by asewol reproduction, one organism gives rise to two individuals which are similar in body design, but having subtle differences. These will in turn give rise to two individuals in the next generation. In this way. the four individuals formed will be different from each other. If sexual reproduction is involved, greater diversity will bbe generated in the offsprings as compared to asexual reproduction where only minor differences would be {generated due to small inaccuracies in DNA copying. Depending on the nature of variations, different individuals would have different kinds of advantages. Selection of variants by environmental factors forms the basis for evolutionary processes. MOST LIKELY Questions Short Answer Type-lI Questions (SA-II) [3 marks ] L.Newiy formed DNA copies may not be identical at times. Give reason. ‘Ans. The replication of DNA in the cell is done by biochemical reactions, No biachernical reaction ‘can reproduce exactly the same result. So, when the DNA present in the nucleus of the parent cell undergoes replication, then slight Variations occur in the two DNA copies formed. Due to this, the two DNA molecules formed willbe similar but may not be exactly identical tothe porent DNA. These voriations in the replication of DNA molecule will also lead to slight variations jn the offspring produced by asexual reproduction. | Topic 2| HEREDITY Genetics is the branch of biology which studies hheredity and variation Inheritance is the transmission ‘of genetically controlled traits from one generation to the next. Inherited Traits “The trois or characteristics that are transmitted from ‘one generation to the next are controlled by genes. A ‘gene is a segment of DNA which is responsible for the synthesis of proteins that contains a specific character ‘of the organism. An example is the free earlobes and ‘attached earlobes found in human population. Mendel’s Contributions Gregor Mendel was the first scientist to. make a systematic study of patterns of inheritance which involved the transfer of characteristics from parents to progeny (offsprings). He is known as the Father of Genetics. Mendel’s Experiment Mendel used a number of contrasting visible characters of garden peas - roundjwrinkled seeds, tallshort plants, white/violet flowers and so on. He took pea plants with different characteristics ~ a tall plant and a short plant, produced progeny from them, and calculated the percentages of tall or short progeny. Mendel chose pea plants for studying inheritance because pea plants had a number of distinct differences which were easy to tell oport. (2) Avoilabilty of detectable contrasting troits of several characters. (2) Shore life span of the plant.(2) Normally allows selfertilsation but cross- fertilisation can also be carried out. (4) Large number of seeds produced. Monehybrid inheritance: @) It concerns the inheritance of a single plant characteristic such as plant height or colour of flowers. (@) Mendel first crossed pure-bred tall pea plants with pure-bred dwarf pea plants and found thot there were no halfway characteristics or ‘'medium-height’ plants in this frst generation, or F, progeny. All plants were tall (@) Mendel then crossed the toll pea plants of the first generation by self pollination and found that the second-generation, or F, progeny of the Fi toll plants are not al tall. Instead, one quarter of them were short, (4) Both the tollness and shortness traits were inherited in the F, plants, but only the tallness trait was expressed. (8) Two copies of the trait are inherited in each sexually reproducing organism. These two may bbe identical, or may be different, depending on the parentage. {Out of a total 1064 pea plants of F, generation, ‘Mendel found that there were 787 tall pea plants, ‘and 277 dwarf pea plants. The ratio of tall plants, to dwarf plants comes to be approximately 3: 1. The ratio 3: 1 is nown as the monohybrid ratio. eg, The genotypic ratio of Fz progenyis TT=Te: eli2 Dihybrid inheritance: @) ft concerns the inheritance of characteristics when pea plants showing two different characteristics, rather than just one, are bred with each other. The progeny of a tal plant with round seeds and ‘a short plant with wrinkled-seeds are al tall and hhave round seeds. Tollness and round seeds are thus dominant traits. (8) When these F, progeny are used to generate F progeny by self-pollination, some F progeny ‘ore tall plants with round seeds, and some were short plants with wrinkled seeds. (@) There would also be some F, progeny that showed new mixtures. Some of them would be tall, but have wrinkled seeds, while others would bbe short, buthave round seeds. (8) The tollfshort trait and the round seed/wrinkled seed trait are independently inherited. Independent inheritance of two separate traits: In the inheritance of more than one pair of traits in a cross simultaneously, the factors responsible for each pair of traits are distributed independently to the gametes. ‘The dihybrid cross can be shown by drawing a chart ‘os shown: Parental Cross Pore phenotype —+ Pantshavng | Ronishovng = * Faioncfoomtee (crownmtne sb) IE EIe HRT EARE@ ®OO® orntes om caer i Important Terms used in Heredity Chromosome: Chromosomes are the corriers of genes ond are long thread lite structures present in the nucleus of a cell Each gene set is present ‘0s separate independent pieces, each called a chromosome. DNA: Cellular DNA is the information source for ‘making proteins in the cell. ONA is the genetic ‘material DNA is the carrier of genetic information from generation to generation. Every chromosome contains one molecule of DNA and genes ore segments of DNA. Genes: Gene is 0 segment of a large molecule called deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) which forms the most important constituent of chromosome. Genes are located on the chromosomes at fixed positions and their number is estimated to be between 30, 000 to 40,000. Genes control characteristics or traits. Allele: One of the different forms of a particular gene ‘occupying the same position on a chromosome. Factor: The carriers of hereditary information were called as factors by Mendel. He considered each and ‘every character as 0 unit. which was controlled by & ‘factor’ based on his experiments with garden pea, Fi, generation: When two parents cross or breed to produce progeny, then their progeny is called frst filial generation. Fz generation: When the first generation progeny ‘cross among themselves to produce second progeny.‘then this progeny is colled second filial generation. Diploid: The paired condition of chromosomes is called diploid. The diploid number of chromosomes is specific for a species and every cell has diploid number of chromosomes. Hoploid: tt is the set of unpaired chromosomes. ‘Gametes have haploid set of chromosomes. Homologous chromosome: Members of a pair of ‘chromosomes are exactly identical as for os shape ‘and size are concerned and hence called homologous ‘chromosomes. ‘Genotype: is the description of genes present in an ‘organisrn itis always a pair of letters such as TT, Tt or ‘tt (where T and t are the different forms of the same gene). Phenotype: The characteristic or trait which is visible in an organism is colled its phenotype. Being toll or dwarf are phenotypes of a plant as these traits are visible Dominant and recessive traits: In this explanation, bboth TT and Teare tall plants, while only tis @ short Plant. In other words, a single copy of Tis enough ‘to maka the plant tal, while both eopies have to be “Y for the plant to be short. So, a tall plant will have ‘genotype TT or Tt, whereas a short plant will have ‘genotype tt. Traits like "Tare colled dominant traits ‘or expressed traits, while those that behave like Y are called recessive traits or repressed traits. Mendel’s Laws of Inheritance Law Definition Low of During gamete formation, the alleles for each gene segregate th Segregation fiom each other so. that each gamete carries only one allele for each gene. Low of Genes for different traits can Independent Segtegate independently during ‘Acsonment the formation of gametes. Law oF Some alleles are dominant while Dominance others are recessive: on organism with at least one dominant allele will display the effect of the dominant allele. Expression of Traits Genes control characteristics or traits in all ‘organisms. Cellular DNA is the information source ‘for making proteins in the cell Each trait is governed by @ particular hormone and the amount of the hormone made depends on the efficiency of the pprocess for making it which in turn depends on a particular enzyme that is important for this process. If this enzyme works efficiently, a lot of hormone will be made and ifthe gene for that enzyme has an ‘alteration that makes the enzyme less efficient. the ‘omount of hormone will be lass. Mechanism of Inheritance The rules for inheritance of waits in sexually reproducing organisms are related to the fact that both the parents contribute practically equal amounts of genetic material to the offspring. This means that each trait can be influenced by both paternal and ‘maternal DNA. Thus, for each trait there will be two versions in each affepring. Every germ cell takas one chromosome from each pir and these may be of maternal or parental origin. When two germ calls combine, they will restore the ‘normal number of chromosomes in the progeny and in this way the DNA of the species becomes stable. Sex Determination Inhuman beings, the sex of the offspring in the zygote ‘ofter fertilization of the male and female gamete is determined by the sex chromosome. The rest of the chromosomes are called autosomes. Human beings have 22 pairs of autosomes and one pair of sex chromosome. The females carry two X- chromosomes ‘but the males carry a single X and a Y chromosome. ‘Among the male gametes, half of the sperms carry Xechromosome and half carry Y-chromosome. In human beings, the sex of the individual is largely ‘genetically determined. (2) When a sperm carrying X-chromosome fertlizes ‘an egg, the zygote develops into fernale (OX). (2) When a sperm carrying Y-chromosome fertilzes can egg, the zygote develops into male (XY). ‘Sex determination in Human beings PARENTS: FATHER MOTHER Fe repuie remote Merle Soap offprings Gta female ch Sep Effect of | environmental determination: In some reptiles, the temperature at which the fertilized egg is incubated before hatching is important for sex determination. (2) In ature high incubation temperature results i development of female progeny. (2) Inthe case of lizard, high incubation temperature resuits in development of male progeny. factors on sexMOST LIKELY Questions Short Answer Type-I Questions (SA-!) [2 marks } 2.1f@ pure tall pea plants crossed with « pure ‘dwarf pea plant, then in F; generation only tall plants appear. What happens to the ‘traits of the dwarf plant? ‘Ans. Although in Fy generation only the tall plants ‘appear, both the taliness and dwarfness ‘roits are inherited in the Fy plants but aos the tollness trait is dominant, it is expressed, whereas, dwarfness trait being recessive is not ‘expressed. It is expressed in Fz generation. 3. (A) Why did Mendel carry out on experiment to study inheritance of two traits in garden-pea? (©) What were his findings with respect to Inheritance of traits in Fx and Fr generation? (©)State the ratio obtained in the F, generation in the above mentioned experiment. ‘Ans. (A) Mendel carried out an experiment to study inheritance of two traits in garden pea to see the interaction and basis of inheritance between them. He also concluded that also traits segregate during gamete formation ‘ond finally he gave three laws. (1) Low of segregation @ Law of Dominance (3) Law of Independent Assortment @ Mendel observed that—in F, generation, feature of only one parental type appear. The features of other parents were not ‘expressed. He called the first one which ‘appeared as dominant features/character ‘ond the other features which did not ‘oppear called them as recessive. The characters are not lost even when they ‘ore not expressed. When F, off springs were allowed to be self pollinated, both the porental traits ‘were expressed in defiite proportion in F2 ‘generation. He had started with two combinations of characteristics and two new combinations of characteristics ppearedin F, generation. From the F2 generation of a dihybrid cross Mendel postulated that inheritance of factors which contol a particular trait jn an organism are independent of the other. This is called Law of Independent Assortment. (© Ratio obtained in the Fz generation in the ‘above mentioned experiment 9:3:3:1 rey ey ZI\N LI\N Romy thy RY Fy Gometes vy oy oF RY RRYY RR | RAY | RY Ry Rey RR Ry Rwy yoRYY RY mY my my Ry Ruy my muy Fa generation: Planes with Plants Plants with Plants with round and with round wrinkled — wrinled yellow and green and yellow 2 and green. coloured coloured coloured coloured seeds seeds. «seed ©=——seeds oe: a: a: 1 4.In a study It was found thet fused ear lobes were found in more numbers within a population rather than free ear lobes. What. can you infer from the above observation with respect to dominant/recessive trait? “Ans. It can be inferred from the observation that fused ear lobes were found in more numbers within « population that fused ear lobes is a dominant trait whereas free ear lobes is a recessive trait.« Mention the function of cellular DNA. Taking tallness as. characteristicfora plant, explain how proteins control the characteristic. ‘Ans. The major function of the DNA is to store information and pass it to offspring. It also directs the synthesis of proteins, which are necessary for a cell to perform its functions. The part of DNA that provides information for protein synthesis is called gene. Proteins ‘control specific characteristic or trait of an ‘organism. For example, a plant species has gene for the characteristic colled ‘tollness’. Now. the gene for tallness will give orders to the plant cells to make a lot of plant growth hormones. Due to the formation of excess of plant growth hormones, the plant will grow tall IF the plant has genes for dwarfness, then plant growth hormones production will be Low. Asaresult, the plant will not grow tall and will remain short. The above examples explain how proteins control the characteristic. Case Based Questions [4 marks ] '6.Sahil performed an experiment to study the inheritance pattem of genes. He crossed tall pea plants (TT) with short pea plants (t) and obtained ‘ll tal plants in F; generation, (A) What will be set of genes present in the Fy ‘generation? © Give reason why only tall plants are observed nF, progeny. (© When F, plants were self - pollinated, a total ‘of 800 plants were producad. How many of these would be tall, medium height or short plants? Give the genotype of F2 generation. ‘Ans. (A) Te Troits like T ore called dominant traits, while those that behave lite ‘t’ are called recessive troits/Alternatively accept the definition of dominant and recessive traits with examples of T and t respectively / Alternatively accept the law of Dominance with examples of T and t. (© Out oF 800 plants 600 plants will be tall ‘and 200 plants willbe smoll 177: 2Tt: 1tt ® concept Applied “+ Cross between the pea plants with one pair of contrasting characters is called a manohybrid cross. Here the contrasting character are toliness and shoreness of pea plants. Menohybrid cross Parents Taliplant + Shor plant — Fg ecearowe nt Fy gourson te {generetion possess one factor of inheritance from fecch parent plant which was carried in gametes ‘and is dominant trait. Since all the plants in the F ‘generation have the factors Te: so allo ther ore tll When F; progeny was allowed to be self pollinated, both the parental trats were expressed in definite proprtan nF gerraion Sel Plinaton eee kk Gometes b ‘5 b ‘5 fe vt | seneaion ™ | m Ta_| ste Phen pi aie 3:1 wor 3 ier as z Gomapereie Tr Teoe 7.Xelinked recessive inheritance is a mode of inheritance in which a mutation in a gene on the X chromesome causes the phenotype to be ‘always expressedin males (who are necessarily homozygous for the gene mutation because they have one X and one Y chromosome) ‘and in females who are homozygous for the gene mutation. Females with one copy of the ‘mutated gene are carriers. X-linked inheritance ‘means that the gene causing the trait or the disorder is located on the X chromosome. In humans, inheritance of X-linked recessive waits follows a unique pattern as shown below:« Mention the function of cellular DNA. Taking tallness as. characteristicfora plant, explain how proteins control the characteristic. ‘Ans. The major function of the DNA is to store information and pass it to offspring. It also directs the synthesis of proteins, which are necessary for a cell to perform its functions. The part of DNA that provides information for protein synthesis is called gene. Proteins ‘control specific characteristic or trait of an ‘organism. For example, a plant species has gene for the characteristic colled ‘tollness’. Now. the gene for tallness will give orders to the plant cells to make a lot of plant growth hormones. Due to the formation of excess of plant growth hormones, the plant will grow tall IF the plant has genes for dwarfness, then plant growth hormones production will be Low. Asaresult, the plant will not grow tall and will remain short. The above examples explain how proteins control the characteristic. Case Based Questions [4 marks ] '6.Sahil performed an experiment to study the inheritance pattem of genes. He crossed tall pea plants (TT) with short pea plants (t) and obtained ‘ll tal plants in F; generation, (A) What will be set of genes present in the Fy ‘generation? © Give reason why only tall plants are observed nF, progeny. (© When F, plants were self - pollinated, a total ‘of 800 plants were producad. How many of these would be tall, medium height or short plants? Give the genotype of F2 generation. ‘Ans. (A) Te Troits like T ore called dominant traits, while those that behave lite ‘t’ are called recessive troits/Alternatively accept the definition of dominant and recessive traits with examples of T and t respectively / Alternatively accept the law of Dominance with examples of T and t. (© Out oF 800 plants 600 plants will be tall ‘and 200 plants willbe smoll 177: 2Tt: 1tt ® concept Applied “+ Cross between the pea plants with one pair of contrasting characters is called a manohybrid cross. Here the contrasting character are toliness and shoreness of pea plants. Menohybrid cross Parents Taliplant + Shor plant — Fg ecearowe nt Fy gourson te {generetion possess one factor of inheritance from fecch parent plant which was carried in gametes ‘and is dominant trait. Since all the plants in the F ‘generation have the factors Te: so allo ther ore tll When F; progeny was allowed to be self pollinated, both the parental trats were expressed in definite proprtan nF gerraion Sel Plinaton eee kk Gometes b ‘5 b ‘5 fe vt | seneaion ™ | m Ta_| ste Phen pi aie 3:1 wor 3 ier as z Gomapereie Tr Teoe 7.Xelinked recessive inheritance is a mode of inheritance in which a mutation in a gene on the X chromesome causes the phenotype to be ‘always expressedin males (who are necessarily homozygous for the gene mutation because they have one X and one Y chromosome) ‘and in females who are homozygous for the gene mutation. Females with one copy of the ‘mutated gene are carriers. X-linked inheritance ‘means that the gene causing the trait or the disorder is located on the X chromosome. In humans, inheritance of X-linked recessive waits follows a unique pattern as shown below: