Mendel, First Geneticist p. 66

Who Likes Peas?

This guy, that’s who.

Table of Contents 12/9/13Mendel, First Geneticist66

Essential Question Who was Gregor Mendel, and how did he discover the basis of heredity by breeding pea plants?

Assignment Read pages D-34 – 38.

Stopping to Think 1 What personal qualities do you think Mendel must have had that helped him in his work? Mendel was devoted, persistent, and patient. He was also devoted to science.

Stopping to Think 2 a)What were the advantages for Mendel in using pea plants for his breeding investigations? Pea plants grow quickly, produce numerous seeds, and have many observable characteristics.

Stopping to Think 2 b) Why did Mendel perform so many crosses for the same characteristics? Mendel did many crosses to make sure that his results were accurate.

Define “Recessive” The trait that is “hidden.” The opposite of dominant. *Recessive alleles only show up if there is no dominant. Example: Blue tails are dominant, orange tails are recessive.

Allele different forms of genes (represented by letter) Example: The blue tail color allele. The yellow seed color allele.

Stopping to Think 3 Explain how the coin-tossing model we did in class works exactly like Mendel’s explanation for his results with pea plants. The model is the same because there are three possibilities for the dominant allele to be expressed, and only one for the recessive allele.