BIOL239 Chapter Notes -Gamete, Dwarfism, Zygote
17 Apr 2013
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Mendel"s experimental organism: the garden pea: mendel"s success attributed to choice of experimental test subjects, garden peas easily grown in gardens or green houses. Pea flowers contain both male and female organs. The male sex organ, anthers, produce sperm containing pollen, and the female organ, the ovary, produces eggs. Flower petals close down, preventing pollen from entering or leaving the flower: this causes self fertilization, pollen and eggs from the same flower fertilize to produce seeds. Pea strains are highly inbred, displaying little genetic variation from generation to generation: called true-breeding: each true-breeding pea strain was distinguished by one specific characteristic, such as size or color. Focusing on single differences allowed him to study 1 trait at a time: mendel succeeded where other biologists failed because they studied multiple traits at once. Each of the parental strains in the cross carried two identical versions of the gene, therefore diploid and homozygous.
