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Lydia Rabe
Mrs. Roundy
FHS 1500
September 16, 2016
Genetic Advice

Genetics shows us what kind of traits offspring can contract from their parents. What
genes they get from either parent determine the childs characteristics. In a nonadditive form of
heredity, alleles interact in a dominant-recessive pattern, in which one allele, the dominant gene,
is far more influential than the other, the recessive gene. When someone inherits a recessive
gene that is not expressed in the phenotype, that person is said to be a carrier of that gene: The
recessive gene is carried on the phenotype. If the dominant gene is present, it will be the
expressed trait in the offspring. If there is no dominant gene, the two recessive genes take over.
If the parents are heterogeneous for their dominant traits, then sometimes the child can have
completely different visible traits than either of the parents. This can cause confusion for people
who do not understand the topic.
This example couple has dark brown hair. The father does not understand how with their
dark hair his baby could have inherited blonde hair. The father of the mother was blonde, and
the mother of the father was blonde. The father claims that this fact cannot have anything to do
with his babys blonde hair, because obviously neither himself nor his wife have any genes for
blonde hair. He is convinced that the child is not his.
Because the parents of the parents have blonde hair, then the parents of the child must be
heterogeneous in their genes for hair color. They can not have inherited two dominant genes,

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because one of their parents only possesses two recessive genes. Each of the parents must also
have one dominant gene, because their expressed trait is the dominant one. This means that both
the parents of the baby inherited one gene for dark brown hair, and one gene for blonde hair.
Given these circumstances, the couple had a twenty-five percent chance of having a
blonde baby, and a seventy-five percent chance of having a dark haired baby. They could have
had children with dark-dark genes, dark-blonde genes, or blonde-blonde genes. This would have
provided them a much greater likelihood of having a dark haired baby, but it is entirely possible
that this blonde baby resulted from the inherited genes of these two parents.
Genetics can be confusing to those who dont understand it, like the father of this baby.
Because some genes are dominant and some are recessive, it is entirely possible for children to
inherit characteristics that were not visible in either of their parents. Parents with heterogeneous
traits can pass on characteristics that they did not even know they possessed the genes for. While
they have a greater likelihood of passing on their expressed trait, the possibility is always there
that their child will look completely different.
Mothers hair gene
Mother

Father

Bb

Bb

Bb

Bb

The mother had to have inherited a heterogeneous Bb, because she has dark hair and her father
only has blonde genes to pass on.
Fathers hair gene

Father

Mother
b
b

Bb

Bb

Bb

Bb

The father had to have inherited a heterogeneous Bb, because he has dark hair and his mother
only has blonde genes to pass to her offspring.

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Babys hair gene

Mother

Father

BB

Bb

Bb

bb

The baby had a 25% chance of inheriting blonde hair because of the genes its parents received
from its grandparents.

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Works cited

Berger, Kathleen Stassen. Invitation to the Life Span. New York: Worth, 2014. Print.