Lesson 4 — Dihybrid Crosses


Self-Check 


Answer the following questions to check your understanding of the material in this lesson.

  1. In pepper plants, green (G) fruit colour is dominant to red (g) fruit colour, and round (R) fruit shape is dominant to square (r) fruit shape. These two genes are located on different chromosomes.

    1. What gamete types will be produced by a heterozygous green, round plant?

    2. If two such heterozygous plants are crossed, what genotypes and phenotypes will be seen in the offspring, and in what proportions?

  2. In watermelons, the genes for green colour and for short shape are dominant over the alleles for striped colour and for long shape. Suppose a plant with long, striped fruit is crossed with a plant that is heterozygous for green colour and homozygous for short shape. What are the phenotypes of their offspring? (Show all your work.)

  3. In humans, a cleft chin is due to a dominant allele (D), but the recessive allele (d) produces no cleft. Most people have free ear lobes due to a dominant allele (E), and a person with attached ear lobes has two recessive alleles (e). Assume that the mother is homozygous for cleft chin and heterozygous for free ear lobes and the father is heterozygous for both traits, and respond to the following:

    1. What is the probability that their baby will have the following?
      1. A cleft chin and attached ear lobes
      2. A cleft chin and free ear lobes
      3. No cleft chin and free ear lobes
      4. No cleft chin and attached ear lobes

    2. Draw a Punnett square to support your answer.

  4. In dogs, the allele for black coat colour (B) is dominant over the allele for white coat colour (b). The allele for short hair (S) is dominant over the allele for long hair (s). The phenotypes of offspring from several crosses are given below.

    Cross

    Parental Phenotypes

    Phenotypes of Offspring

    Black short

    Black long

    White short

    White long

    1

    Black, short x black, long

    16

    15

    0

    0

    2

    White, short x white, short

    0

    0

    27

    8

    3

    Black, short x black, long

    6

    5

    3

    2

    4

    Black, long x black, long

    0

    31

    0

    10


    Respond to the following:

    1. What are the genotypes for parents of each of the four crosses? (You cannot be sure of Cross 1.)

    2. If the black coat colour and long hair offspring from Cross 3 is crossed with the black and short hair offspring from Cross 1 (assume both parents are BB), what proportion of the offspring will have black, short hair? Is it possible to have offspring with white, long hair from this cross?

    Self-Check Answers


    1.  
      1. The green round plant will produce GR, Gr, gR, and gr gametes in equal proportion because the genes are not linked.

      2. This will give 9/16 green round, 3/16 green square, 3/16 red round, and 1/16 red square phenotypes; the genotypes are given in the Punnett square below.

    2. Allele assignment:     G = green, g = striped, S = short, s = long.
      Parents:                      ggss x GgSS
      Gametes:                   gs x GS, gS
      Offspring:                   GgSs, ggSs
      Phenotype:                50% green short : 50% striped short

    3. Parents:    DDEe             x          DdEe
      Gametes: DE and De       x          DE, De, dE and de

      1. What is the probability that their baby will have the following?
        1. A cleft chin and attached ear lobes         1/4
        2. A cleft chin and free ear lobes                3/4
        3. No cleft chin and free ear lobes                0
        4. No cleft chin and attached ear lobes        0

      2. Punnett square supporting the answer:


      1. Cross 1:         BBSs  x          BBss               Cross 2:         bbSs   x          bbSs
        Cross 3:         BbSs  x          Bbss               Cross 4:         Bbss   x          Bbss

      2. Offspring with black, short hair:       1/2 or 50%
        White long hair is not possible with this cross because the only colour allele present is B.

Diploma Connection


Answer the following questions from a previous Biology 30 Diploma Examination.

    Use the following information to answer the next question.

    In tomato plants, purple stems (P) are dominant to green stems (p), and red tomatoes (T) are dominant to yellow tomatoes (t). The two genes are located on separate chromosomes.

    A purple-stemmed, red-tomato plant is crossed with a purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plant. They produce

    • 28 purple-stemmed, red-tomato plants
    • 31 purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants
    • 11 green-stemmed, red-tomato plants
    • 9 green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants


  1. The genetic compositions of the parents are

    1. PpTt and PPTT
    2. PPTt and PpTT
    3. PpTt and PpTt
    4. PpTt and Pptt


  2. One of the green-stemmed, red-tomato plants was crossed with another tomato plant. One of the offspring was a purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plant. If this offspring were crossed with a green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plant, then the possible phenotype(s) of the offspring would be

    1. green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants
    2. green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants and purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants
    3. green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants; purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants; and purple-stemmed, red-tomato plants
    4. green-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants; purple-stemmed, yellow-tomato plants; purple-stemmed, red-tomato plants; and green-stemmed, red-tomato plants


  3. Use the following information to answer the next question.

    Gregor Mendel examined the inheritance of two traits in pea plants: seed coat texture and colour. Seed coat texture can be represented as S-smooth or s-wrinkled, and seed coat colour can be represented as Y-yellow or y-green. SSYY plants were crossed with ssyy plants to yield F1 pea seeds that were all smooth and all yellow. By crossing plants grown from these F1 seeds, Mendel obtained four different phenotypes of F2 seeds:

    • smooth, green seeds
    • wrinkled, green seeds
    • smooth, yellow seeds
    • wrinkled, yellow seeds


    Numerical Response

  4. The F2 seed phenotype ratio that Mendel obtained upon crossing two heterozygous smooth, yellow F1 individuals would have been

    Answer:          _____ :                 _____ :                 _____ :                 _____
                         smooth,            wrinkled,            smooth,             wrinkled,
                         green                  green                 yellow               yellow


  5. Use the following additional Information to answer the next question.

    Mendel selected two varieties of pea plants from seeds he had grown. One variety of peas came from a field planted with smooth, yellow seeds. Another variety of peas came from a field planted with wrinkled, green seeds. These two varieties of peas were crossed to produce

    • 255 plants with smooth, green seeds
    • 268 plants with wrinkled. green seeds
    • 237 plants with smooth, yellow seeds
    • 240 plants with wrinkled, yellow seeds

    From the phenotype ratio of the offspring, Mendel deduced that the smooth and yellow parents had the genotype YySs.


  6. This type of cross is referred to as a

    1. test cross
    2. monohybrid cross
    3. homozygous cross
    4. heterozygous cross


  7. Use the following information to answer the next question.

    In pea plants, tall (T) is dominant over short (t), and round seed (R) is dominant over wrinkled seed (r). The Punnett square below shows a cross between a heterozygous tall, heterozygous round-seed pea plant and a short, heterozygous round-seed pea plant. Different types of offspring are represented by numbers.


     

    TR

    Tr

    tR

    tr

    tR

    1

    2

    3

    4

    tr

    5

    6

    7

    8


  8. Which two types of offspring are pure breeders for both plant height and seed shape?

    1. 1 and 6
    2. 2 and 5
    3. 3 and 8
    4. 4 and 7

Diploma Question Answers


  1. D
  2. B
  3. 3193
  4. A
  5. C

Biology 30 © 2008  Alberta Education & its Collaborative Partners ~ Updated by ADLC 2019