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Each of these offspring contains numerous genes which have coding for specific tasks and properties. Males and females both contribute equally to the genotypes of their offspring, in which gametes fuse and form. An important aspect of the formation of the parent offspring is the chromosome, which is a structure of DNA which contains many genes. [1]
Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant males and females will sexually reproduce and have offspring together.
Heredity of phenotypic traits: a father and son with prominent ears and crowns. DNA structure. Bases are in the centre, surrounded by phosphate–sugar chains in a double helix. In humans, eye color is an example of an inherited characteristic: an individual might inherit the "brown-eye trait" from one of the parents. [1]
Offspring inherit one allele for each trait from each parent. Thus, offspring have a combination of the parents' genes. It is believed that "the masking of deleterious alleles favors the evolution of a dominant diploid phase in organisms that alternate between haploid and diploid phases" where recombination occurs freely.
If the traits that give these individuals a reproductive advantage are also heritable, that is, passed from parent to offspring, then there will be differential reproduction, that is, a slightly higher proportion of fast rabbits or efficient algae in the next generation. Even if the reproductive advantage is very slight, over many generations ...
Mendelian traits behave according to the model of monogenic or simple gene inheritance in which one gene corresponds to one trait. Discrete traits (as opposed to continuously varying traits such as height) with simple Mendelian inheritance patterns are relatively rare in nature, and many of the clearest examples in humans cause disorders.
Mendel studied "trait inheritance", patterns in the way traits are handed down from parents to offspring over time. He observed that organisms (pea plants) inherit traits by way of discrete "units of inheritance". This term, still used today, is a somewhat ambiguous definition of what is referred to as a gene.
The offspring display traits and characteristics of both parents, but are often sterile, preventing gene flow between the species. [34] Sterility is often attributed to the different number of chromosomes between the two species. For example, donkeys have 62 chromosomes, horses have 64 chromosomes, and mules or hinnies have 63