Punnett square practice

Instructions:
Be able to complete questions from all sections of this packet:
a) one trait, b) testcrosses, c) two-trait , d) sex-linked, e) pedigrees, f) linked genes

Mendelian inheritance non-Mendelian inheritance

Tutorial:
All organisms possess two alleles for a gene. If there are only two alleles (dominant and
recessive), then there are three possible genotypes:

Genotypes Letters Name

homo = same
Dominant, dominant RR homozygous dominant
Dominant, recessive Rr heterozygous (or hybrid)
hetero = different
Recessive, recessive rr homozygous recessive

While there are three possible genotypes, there are only two possible phenotypes:

Genotype Phenotype
RR round seed
Rr round seed
rr wrinkled seed

Key: R = round seed r = wrinkled seed

By convention, we use the first letter of the dominant trait

One trait Punnett square problems:

Sample:
Green eyes are dominant over blue eyes (recessive). G = _green__ g = _blue____

If I have a homozygous recessive parent and a heterozygous parent, what are the odds that the
offspring will have green eyes?
Gg
G g
Note: it does not matter
g which parent you put on the
top or side.
gg Gg gg
Create another Punnett square
reversing the order on the left
g to prove this to yourself.
Gg gg

2 of the 4 squares are possible offspring with green eyes. The other two are “gg” or will
have blue eyes. So the answer is:

2 possible with green eyes = 50% phenotype ratio: 1:1

4 total possibilities (dominant / recessive)
(Note: typically ratios are reduced – so 2:2  1:1)

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how to make answers in terms of ratios? just write the fractions in a
1) Yellow seeds are dominant
common over recessivethen
denominator, green seeds.
drop Cross a homozygous dominant
the denominator
yellow seeded-plant
ex:with a green-seeded
2/4 green, plant. =What
2/4 blue above are the
2:2 blue oddsratio
: green of getting
(or 1:1a –plant with
reduced)
green seeds?

Legend: X = yellow seeds x = green seeds Parent 1: XX Parent 2: xx

Phenotype ratio: 1 : 0, yellow: green

Answer: 0 percent green seeds

2) Pea plants can have round seeds (dominant) or wrinkled seeds (recessive). Cross a
heterozygous round-seed plant with a plant that has wrinkled seeds. What is the phenotype
ratio of the offspring?

Legend: Y = round seeds y = wrinkled seeds Parent 1: Yy Parent 2: yy

Phenotype ratio: 1 : 1, Round : Wrinkled

3) Sickle cell anemia is a recessive disorder in humans. Therefore, not having sickle cell is
dominant, and having sickle cell is recessive. Cross a heterozygous mother with a father who
has sickle cell anemia. What are the odds that they have a child with sickle cell and then
another child with sickle cell (think about what you do with independent probabilities)?

4) Polydactyly (having a 6th toe or finger) is a dominant condition in humans. Mom has
polydactyly and dad does not, and they have 1 son who had polydactyly at birth, and 2 other
children who did not. With this information, identify the genotypes of both parents.

5) Huntington’s disease is a dominant trait (not having Huntington’s is recessive) that

unfortunately does not show any obvious symptoms until a person reaches age 40-50. Most
people have children by then and pass on their genes before they know they have a genetic
disorder. A father is a heterozygous for Huntington’s and the mother does not have
Huntington’s. What are the odds that their children might inherit the disorder?

6) Cystic fibrosis is another human genetic disorder caused by one gene. Not having cystic
fibrosis is dominant, and cystic fibrosis is recessive. You are a genetic counselor advising 2
parents who are both heterozygous and do not have cystic fibrosis. What are the odds that
they could have a child with the condition?

7) Pea plants can have large leaves (recessive) or small leaves (dominant). Two small-leaf
plants are crossed, and 50 offspring are planted. 36 of the offspring have small leaves, and
14 of the offspring have large leaves. Identify the genotypes of the parents.

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One-trait problems with chi-square statistics

8) A student is working with fruit fly cultures and gets the following results through 3
generations.

Just because it is dominant doesn’t mean it shows more in the population

Original P generation: male wild-type red eyes female black eyes

F1 generation: 32 males, 28 females all wild-type red eyes – This is dominant

since the allele from mom and dad show all offspring having wild-type red eyes.

F2 generation: 26 males wild-type red eyes 24 females wild-type red eyes

11 males black eyes 11 females black eyes

or (50 total wild-type red eyes 22 total black eyes) - autosomal

a) Based on the evidence from P  F1 generation, what is dominant and what is recessive?
b) If male and female F1 flies mate to create the F2 generation, what results should we expect
to get in the next generation (phenotype ratio)?
c) Do these actual results above support this model of inheritance presented above? Does the
chi-square value support the model? (p < 0.05)

9) A student is working with the model that wild type normal wings are dominant over recessive
vestigial (messed-up) wings. He believes that he is crossing a heterozygous fly with a
homozygous recessive fly. He gets 8 wild type offspring and 4 vestigial wing offspring.

Make a Punnett square for his prediction and calculate the chi-square value based on the
actual results he got. Is his model supported by the actual data (p < 0.05)? If not, propose an
alternative hypothesis and see if chi-square statistics support that model.

10) A student is crossing two heterozygous flies and gets 83 flies with the dominant phenotype,
and 31 flies with the recessive phenotype. Does this data support the student’s understanding
of the genetic cross (p < 0.05)?

Test cross problems – see figure 14.7 p. 256

11) You cannot tell apart a homozygous dominant plant from a heterozygous plant just by
looking at them – why not?

Let’s say purple stem is dominant over green stem, and you have a homozygous dominant
purple stem plant and a heterozygous purple stem plant.

One way farmers can tell these two apart is to breed the purple stem plant with a
_________________ plant – we do this because we know this plant’s genotype: ________.

This is called a testcross. Draw Punnett squares for both crosses and explain how this
testcross can differentiate homozygous dominant and heterozygous.

12) Ranchers use genetics to breed to select for good traits. They like big cows because more
meat = more money. Let’s say there is one gene that causes cows to be super-sized. Super-
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size is dominant over normal size, which is recessive. A rancher only has one super-size cow
right now. When he bred his super-size cow with a normal-size cow, he found that 3 of the
offspring were super-size and 5 were normal size. What was the genotype of the original
super-size cow? What could the rancher do in the future to ensure all super-size offspring?
Two trait Punnett square problems
These problems are similar to one-trait (or monohybrid) Punnett square problems, but we are
considering the inheritance of two different traits simultaneously. These Punnett squares
demonstrate that you understand the connection between meiosis and Punnett squares.

Determining gametes: Remember that Punnett squares have gametes lined up on top and on the
side. Follow these 2 basic rules to determine gametes:
a) Gametes always have half the letters of an individual
b) Gametes must have one of each letter (or one of each type of chromosome)
For example, an SsTt individual can make the following gametes: ST, sT, St, st
An MmEE individual can make the following gametes: ME, mE

Determine the gametes for the following individuals:

13) Iihh 13) XXcc 14) ZzFF 15) BbNn

Sample: Purple flowers and yellow seeds are dominant, and white flowers and green seeds are
recessive. Cross two parent plants who are heterozygous for both traits. What are the odds of
getting offspring that have purple flowers and green seeds?

Key: P = purple flowers p = white flowers Y = yellow seeds y = green seeds

Crossing PpYy x PpYy

Overall
phenotype ratio: 9 : 3 : 3: 1
(both dominant : one dom / one rec : one rec / one dom : both rec)

16) Round seeds are dominant over wrinkled seeds, and purple stems are dominant over green
stems. One parent plant is homozygous dominant for round seeds and heterozygous with
purple stems. The other parent is heterozygous for both traits. What are the odds of getting
an offspring with round seeds and green stems, then an offspring with round seeds and purple
stems (think about what you do with independent probabilities)?
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17) Inflated seed pods are dominant over constricted seed pods. Tall plants are dominant while
short plants are recessive. One parent is homozygous dominant for inflated seed pods, but is
short. The other parent is heterozygous for inflated pods and homozygous dominant for
being tall. What are the odds of getting offspring who are heterozygous for both traits?
Chi-square statistics with two-trait Punnett squares:
18) The black eye mutation and vestigial wing mutation are based on genes found on two
different chromosome pairs in fruit flies. Both mutations are recessive compared to the
dominant wild-type trait (red eyes and normal wings). If two doubly-heterozygous flies are
crossed (the so-called dihybrid cross), what results would you expect to get?

If the actual results are as follows:

red eyes, normal wings: 80 flies red eyes, vestigial wings: 32 flies
black eyes, normal wings: 26 flies black eyes, vestigial wings: 8 flies

Do these results support the Mendelian model of inheritance presented above? (p < 0.05)

19) A student is working with two genes that are on separate chromosome pairs as well. Curly
wings are recessive as are yellow body coloration (versus the wild type normal wings and
brown body coloration).

A student is crossing (they think) a doubly heterozygous fly (for both traits) with a doubly
homozygous recessive fly. Create a Punnett square prediction of the results they expect to
get.

If the actual results are as follows:

normal wings, brown body: 32 normal wings, yellow body: 27
curly wings, brown body: 28 curly wings, yellow body: 30

Do these results support the Mendelian model of inheritance presented above? (p < 0.05)

Sex-linked trait Punnett square problems (see figure 15.10 p. 283)

Sex-linked traits involve genes that are on the sex chromosomes. In this course, we will only be
tracking genes on the X chromosome – there are very few genes on the Y. Since males have XY
chromosomes and females have XX chromosomes, males only have 1 allele while females have
the standard two alleles. Because the genes exist ONLY on the X chromosome, we write the
chromosomes in addition to the alleles in the Punnett square.

Sample: Colorblindness is a human disorder caused by a gene on the X chromosome. Not being
colorblind is dominant, and being colorblind is recessive. Cross a father who is not colorblind
with a heterozygous mother. What are the odds of having a colorblind daughter? How about a
colorblind son? Colorblind daughter odds:
B
X Y (does not carry “B” gene) _0 possibilities_ = 0 %
B
Dad: X Y 2 total daughters
XB Y
Colorblind son odds:
_1 possibility_ = 50 %
Mom: b XBXB XBY
XbB Xb X
XB 2 total sons
XBX
Colorblind child odds:
_1 possibility_ = 25 %
4 total children
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XBXb XbY
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20) Based on the answer above, do males or females have recessive sex-linked disorders more
often? Why? Does mom or dad pass the recessive allele to the son?

21) Hemophilia is another sex-linked human genetic disorder. Hemophilia is also recessive, so
not having hemophilia is dominant. If dad has hemophilia while mom is homozygous
dominant, what are the odds of having a child (boy or girl) with hemophilia?

22) Having bar-shaped eyes in fruit flies is a sex-linked recessive trait. In a cross between
unknown parents, half the female offspring and half the male offspring have bar-shaped eyes
(the others have normal eyes). Draw a Punnett square that leads to this result and identify the
genotypes of the parents.

Pedigrees
Pedigrees study the family history of a specific trait. Geneticists study pedigrees to determine
the pattern of inheritance of the trait. The pedigrees below all represent different patterns of
inheritance. The pedigrees could either be autosomal dominant, autosomal recessive, or sex-
linked recessive (there are other patterns of inheritance, but we’ll simplify here).
Pedigree legend:
male without disorder = female without disorder = marriage =
male with disorder = female with disorder = (kids below)

R = having trait
Sample autosomal dominant pedigrees:
r = not having trait

23) What seems to be the pattern for identifying a pedigree as

being autosomal dominant?

Sample autosomal recessive pedigrees:

D = not having trait

d = having trait

24) What seems to be the pattern for identifying a pedigree as being autosomal recessive?

17. Sample sex-linked recessive pedigrees: H

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trait
-06:00
Xh = having trait
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25) What seems to be the pattern for identifying a pedigree as being sex-linked recessive?

More pedigree problems: 26) genotype: ______

27) genotype: ______

30) genotype: ______

28) pattern of inheritance: __________________________
31) genotype: ______

33) genotype: ______

34) genotype: ______

29) pattern of inheritance: __________________________

32) pattern of inheritance: __________________________

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Linked gene inheritance
35) A student is testing to see whether the flower color gene and seed shape gene are on the same
chromosome pair or not (purple flowers dominant, white flowers recessive) (round seeds
dominant, wrinkled seeds recessive).

The student is crossing a doubly heterozygous plant with a doubly homozygous recessive
plant and gets the following results:

purple flowers, round seeds: 62 purple flowers, wrinkled seeds: 7

white flowers, round seeds: 5 white flowers, wrinkled seeds: 56

Create a chi-square calculation to reject (or fail to reject) the hypothesis that the genes are on
different chromosome pairs (what would the expected ratio be if they were on separate
chromosome pairs?)

If the evidence suggests that the two genes are not on separate chromosome pairs, then how
far apart are the genes in map units?

36) A student is testing to see whether the seed color gene and plant height gene are on the same
chromosome pair or not (yellow seed dominant, green seed recessive) (tall height dominant,
short height recessive).

The student is crossing a doubly heterozygous plant with a doubly homozygous recessive
plant and gets the following results:

yellow seed, tall height: 45 yellow seed, short height: 42

green seed, tall height: 48 green seed, short height: 43

Create a chi-square calculation to reject (or fail to reject) the hypothesis that the genes are on
different chromosome pairs (what would the expected ratio be if they were on separate
chromosome pairs?)

If the evidence suggests that the two genes are not on separate chromosome pairs, then how
far apart are the genes in map units?

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