Q&A

What are the three main properties of balancer chromosomes?

What are the three main properties of balancer chromosomes?

Typical balancer chromosomes are designed to (1) carry recessive lethal mutations themselves, eliminating homozygotes which do not carry the desired mutation; (2) suppress meiotic recombination with their homologs, which prevents de novo creation of wild-type chromosomes; and (3) carry dominant genetic markers, which …

What does a balancer chromosome do?

Balancer chromosomes keep homozygous lethal or sterile mutations from being lost from a population and they prevent multiple alleles on the same chromosome from being separated by meiotic recombination. All balancers have two essential features – recessive deleterious mutations and inversion breakpoints.

Is TM6b homozygous lethal?

TM6b is recessive lethal very early in fly development.

What is Drosophila notation?

Primer on Drosophila Notation (simplified from the standard scientific notation) Wild type is designated with a “+” for any allele. Mutations are designated by a letter or letters related to the phenotype of the mutation. Recessively inherited mutations are written in lowercase letters.

What is deleterious mutation?

Listen to pronunciation. (DEH-leh-TEER-ee-us myoo-TAY-shun) A genetic alteration that increases an individual’s susceptibility or predisposition to a certain disease or disorder. When such a variant (or mutation) is inherited, development of symptoms is more likely, but not certain.

What is genetic balancer?

Genetic balancers are genetic constructs or chromosomal rearrangements that allow lethal or sterile mutations to be stably maintained in heterozygotes. In this chapter we use the term balancer primarily to refer to chromosomal duplications or rearrangements that suppress crossing over.

Which chromosome pairs does familial Down’s syndrome involve?

Down syndrome occurs when an individual has a full or partial extra copy of chromosome 21. This additional genetic material alters the course of development and causes the characteristics associated with Down syndrome.

What does the co2 do to the flies?

Carbon dioxide anaesthesia produces significant high mortality in 0- to 3-hr-old flies. Young females are more sensitive to 15 min CO2 treatment than the males. Reduced fecundity is observed in flies that recovered from CO2 exposures.

What are the heterozygous genotypes?

Listen to pronunciation. (HEH-teh-roh-ZY-gus JEE-noh-tipe) The presence of two different alleles at a particular gene locus. A heterozygous genotype may include one normal allele and one mutated allele or two different mutated alleles (compound heterozygote).

Are lethal alleles dominant or recessive?

Lethal alleles may be recessive, dominant, or conditional depending on the gene or genes involved. Lethal alleles can cause death of an organism prenatally or any time after birth, though they commonly manifest early in development.

What does W mean in Drosophila?

showSearch for. white, abbreviated w, was the first sex-linked mutation discovered, found in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster.

How is tm6b built from the third chromosome?

TM6B was built from TM6 by replacing the left breakpoint of In (3LR)P88 with the left end of In (3LR)HR33 (61A1-2;87B) ( Ashburner 1972) by a single crossover ( Figure 1 ).

How are balancer chromosomes used in Drosophila melanogaster?

Balancer chromosomes are multiply inverted chromosomes that suppress meiotic crossing over and prevent the recovery of crossover products. Balancers are commonly used in Drosophila melanogaster to maintain deleterious alleles and in stock construction.

Are there balancers for all three major chromosomes?

They exist for all three major chromosomes, yet the molecular location of the breakpoints and the exact nature of many of the mutations carried by the second and third chromosome balancers has not been available.

Which is the dominant marker on the third chromosome?

Tinderholt (1960) introduced the dominant markers Serrate ( Ser) and Stubble ( Sb) into inverted regions of this chromosome by double crossing over, relying on the increased recombination created by the so-called interchromosomal effect ( Schultz and Redfield 1951; Ramel 1966) to obtain these double crossovers (DCOs).