Chapter: Heredity and evolution Sample questions: 3

1. A Mendelian experiment consisted of breeding tall pea plants bearing violet (dominant) flowers with short pea
plants bearing white flowers. The progeny all bore violet flowers, but almost half of them were short. This suggests
that the genetic make-up of the tall parent can be represented as:
[TTVV, TTvv, TtVV, TtVv]
Ans. TtVV
2. How do traits get expressed in an organism
Ans. in an organism traits are get expressed by the hormones under the influence of enzyme coded genes.
3. Genetics is the study of-
[Inheritance, Cell structure, Only plants, Only animals]
Ans. Inheritance
4. What determines the sex of a child?
[Chromosome content of the ovum, Chromosome content of the sperm, Number of days between ovulation and
fertilization, Number of days between fertilization and implantation]
Ans. Chromosome content of the sperm
5. The Genotype of offspring formed from Tt X tt will be-
[TT and tt, Tt and tt, Only tt, Only TT]
Ans. Tt and tt
6. What is meant by contrasting characters? Give one example.
Ans. The characters which always appear in the opposing condition are called contrasting characters. E.g. tall pea
plant and dwarf pea plant.
7. Which amongst the listed tools was used to study the law of inheritance in pea plant by Gregor J Mendel?
[Family tree, Pedigree chart, Punnett square, Herbarium sheet]
Ans. Punnett square
8. Which statement is true for a dominant allele?
[It cannot undergo mutation, It gives a greater chance of survival than a recessive allele, It gives the same
phenotype in heterozygotes and homozygotes, It is only responsible for male characteristics]
Ans. It gives the same phenotype in heterozygous and homozygous.
9. Which statement about the genotypes of organisms is correct?
[Dominant alleles are only found in homozygotes, One recessive allele always causes a recessive phenotype,
Recessive phenotypes must be homozygous, The dominant phenotype must be heterozygous]
Ans. Recessive phenotypes must be homozygous
10. Mendel’s concept of segregation implies that the two members of an allelic pair of genes-
[Are distributed to separate gametes, May contaminate one another, Are segregated in pairs, Are linked]
Ans. are distributed to separate gametes
11. The genotype of the height of an organism is written as Tt. What conclusion may be drawn?
[There are at least two gene to represent genotype of a trait, There are at least three genes to represent genotype
of a trait, There is no connection between genotype and phenotype, All traits are determined by a single allele]
Ans. There are at least two gene to represent genotype of a trait.
12. Why are traits acquired during the life-time of an individual not inherited?
Ans. The traits acquired during the life-time are the changes in the non-reproductive cells of an organisms and are
not capable of being passed on to the next generation.
13. State one advantage of variation of a species.
Ans. The variation of a species increases the chance of its survival in a changing environment
14. What are hereditary characteristics?
Ans. The characteristics which can be passed from parents to the children are called hereditary characteristics.
15. Explain how sexual reproduction gives rise to more viable variations than asexual reproduction. How does this
affect the evolution of those organisms that reproduce sexually?
Ans. sexual reproduction involves the formation and fusion of male and female gametes. During the formation of
gametes errors will appears in the genetic material of male and female gamets due to the error of DNA copying
mechanism. Fusion of these gametes increase the viability variations again. These variations enable the
organisms to adapt themselves to the changing conditions and also help to give rise to new species.
16. How is the equal genetic contribution of male and female parents ensured in the progeny?

NMKPMNAP 26.11.2024
 Ans. Genetic material in most organisms is present in pairs of chromosomes. Gametes of sexually reproducing
organisms are formed by the process of meiosis during which half of the genetic material goes into each gamete.
When the gametes from male and female parents fuse with each other during sexual reproduction, the normal
amount is restored.
17. Are the variations created by sexual reproduction inheritable or not?
Ans. The variations created in sexual reproduction are inheritable.
18. Who coined the term ‘factor’?
Ans. The term ‘factor’ was coined by Mendel (Factor is the term used by Mendel to denote trait)
19. Define ‘recessive characteristic’.
Ans. Any characteristic present in the parental generation that does not appear in F1 generation but reappear in
F2 generation is known as recessive character. Or a character which can express only when homozygous allelic
condition is recessive character.
20. If a trait A exists in 10% of a population of an asexually reproducing species and a trait B exists in 60% of the
same population, which trait is likely to have arisen earlier?
Ans. As species are asexually reproducing, there would be only very minor differences generated due to small
inaccuracies in DNA copying, so trait B, which exists in 60% of the same population may get inherited earlier
while trait A, which exists in 10% of the population may be originated late due to variations.
21. What constitutes the link between one generation and the next?
Ans. The hereditary information is transferred from parents to offspring through the gametes. So, gametes
constitute the link between one generation and the next and pass on the parental characters to the offspring.
22. What are somatic and germinal variations?
Ans. the variations occurs in the body cells of an organism is called somatic variation. The variations occurs in
the germ cells of an organism is called germinal variation.
23. What is the reason that a male is called 'heterogametic'?
Ans. A male is called heterogametic because he forms two different types of gametes. One containing 'X'
chromosome and the other containing 'Y' chromosome.
24. How can you represent a pure breed symbolically?
Ans. pure breed contains two genes for the same character. Thus, it is represented symbolically by two genes of
either upper case or lower case of the same letter. For example, TT (tall plants) and tt (dwarf plants) are pure
breeds But Tt (tall plants) is not a pure breed as it contains factors for two contrasting characters.
25. How Mendel's experiments show that traits may be dominant or recessive?
Ans. Mendel used a number of contrasting characters of garden pea and cross-pollinated them. He found that in
F1 generation, only one of the traits was expressed. He further self-pollinated the members of F1 progeny and
found that in F2 both characters appeared in 3:1 ratio. He concluded that there are two genes for each traits.
When the cell has two copies of same gene, that particular trait appears. But if the cell has one copy of each gene,
one of the character expresses itself (dominant) while other remained masked (recessive). This shows that traits
such as tallness of pea plant may be dominant while dwarfness may be recessive
26. How do Mendel's experiments show that traits are inherited independently?
Ans. Mendel studied the simultaneous inheritance of two pairs of contrasting characters. He took pure varieties of
plants with yellow round seeds and those with green wrinkled seeds, and crossed them In F1 generation, he
obtained all yellow round seeds indicating these as dominant traits. When he self-pollinated these seeds, he
obtained parental as well as new combinations of characters. There were yellow round seeds, yellow wrinkled
seeds, green round seeds and green wrinkled seeds in ratio of 9:3:3:1. This shows that traits are inherited
independently of each other and do not stay together.
27. How is the sex of the child determined in human beings?
Ans. All human beings have 23 pairs of chromosomes. Out of these, 22 pairs of chromosomes are similar in
males and females. But one pair, called sex chromosomes. Females have a pair of X-chromosomes forming a
perfect pair. Whereas males have mismatched pair with one normal size X-chromosome and a short Y-
chromosome. All child will inherit an X-chromosome from their mother but they can inherit either X or Y-
chromosome from their father. A child who inherits X-chromosome from father will be a girl, one who inherits
Y-chromosome from father will be a boy. Thus, the sex of the child is determine by the chromosome that they
inherit from their father and the probability of a girl or a boy being born in a family is 50-50.

NMKPMNAP 26.11.2024