Extensions of Mendelian Inheritance

This set of flashcards covers key vocabulary and concepts related to extensions of Mendelian inheritance.

Mendelian Inheritance

The inheritance patterns of alleles that obey Mendel's laws, often involving strict dominant/recessive relationships.

Penetrance

The measure of the proportion of individuals with a particular genotype that actually express the phenotype.

Expressivity

The degree to which a genotype is expressed in the phenotype.

Incomplete Dominance

A genetic scenario in which the heterozygote exhibits a phenotype that is intermediate between the corresponding homozygotes.

Codominance

A situation in which both alleles in a heterozygote are fully expressed, resulting in a phenotype that reflects both alleles.

X-linked Inheritance

A pattern of inheritance involving genes located on the X chromosome, where males have one copy and females have two.

Sex-influenced Traits

Traits where an allele is dominant in one sex but recessive in the opposite sex, thus influencing the phenotype based on the sex of the organism.

Lethal Alleles

Alleles that can cause the death of an organism if present in certain combinations.

Pleiotropy

The phenomenon where one gene influences multiple traits or effects on the phenotype.

Epistasis

A gene interaction in which the alleles of one gene mask the phenotypic effects of alleles of another gene.

Gene Redundancy

A phenomenon where one gene can compensate for the loss of function of another gene, leading to no observable effect on phenotype.

Gene Duplication

The occurrence of two or more copies of a gene within an organism, which may evolve and perform similar but not identical functions.