Lanterna Rally

Author: Willard Ralph Singleton

Publisher:

Published: 2015-08-05

Total Pages: 508

ISBN-13: 9781332215829

Excerpt from Elementary Genetics Elementary Genetics is designed as a comprehensive introduction to the subject. The science of genetics has expanded so rapidly in its six decades of existence that there is a wealth of material to draw on. For the sake of simple and direct presentation of the basic principles, examples have been carefully chosen. Some are traditional - Drosophila and maize. Neurospora also appears from Chapter 1 forward throughout the text. There is no special chapter on genetics of microorganisms, any more than on maize or Drosophila, but microorganisms are discussed in many places in the text, wherever they are useful to illustrate a genetic principle. In presenting some newer ways of transferring genetic material, such as transduction and transformation, the microorganisms are the only illustrative material. Hereditary examples are drawn from a wide range of living things, from phage to Pferde (horses). There is a comprehensive chapter on coat color inheritance in mammals. A chapter is devoted to the comparatively new field of biochemical genetics, and another to biochemical genetics in man. Some traditional illustrations of heredity will not be found in this book. For instance, I have not brought in the inheritance of blue versus brown eyes in human beings. There are so many genes modifying eye color that it is difficult, without a breeding test, to tell the true inheritance or genotype of an individual. Much unhappiness has been caused by a literal interpretation of the dictum that the gene for blue eyes is recessive and that blue-eyed parents can never have a brown-eyed child. Eyes that are blue-gray may in fact be the manifestation of a heterozygote for blue and brown. Two such persons could very well have a brown-eyed child. Modifiers undoubtedly affect the major gene for eye color, and it is highly probable that there are cases of low expressivity of the gene for brown that has produced apparently blue eyes in the parent but could give rise to brown eyes in the offspring. For this reason the inheritance of eye color in human beings will not be dealt with in the text. This is the last reference to it. Some examples in the book are also new - for instance, the character so much more striking and also so much more constant than eye color, red hair in human beings. Why this has been neglected for so long as an example ot a hereditary character is something of a mystery. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.