A plant line with reduced fertility comes to the attention of a plant breeder wh

Question

A plant line with reduced fertility comes to the attention of a plant breeder who observes that seed pods often contain a mixture of viable seeds that can be planted to produce new plants, and withered seeds that cannot be sprouted. The breeder examines numerous seed pods in the reduced tertility line and counts 662 viable seeds and 204 nonviable seeds.

a) what single-gene mechanism best explains the breeder's observation?

b) Propose an additional experiment to test the genetic mechanism you propose. If your hypothesis is correct, what experimental outcome do you predict?

Explanation / Answer

a) The ratio of viable seeds and nonviable seeds is almost 3: 1 (662: 204). This may be due to the fact that, the nonviable seeds trait occurs by the inheritance of two recessive genes. Means gene coding for nonviable seeds is recessive to the gene coding for viable seeds.

b) Cross between two heterozygous plants will have the offpsring with the following genotype.

Vv* Vv = VV, Vv, Vv, vv

Where as VV, Vv, Vv are viable and vv (homozygous recessive) is non viable (3: 1 ratio).

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