Monday, March 22, 2010

Lecture, chapter 4 - Pedigree analysis
Lecture, chapter 5 - Inheritance of complex traits

Today we finished chapter 4, on pedigree analysis.

We discussed cases in which the modes of inheritance we covered in previous lectures cannot be detected in a pedigree, because of complex gene and environmental interactions that prevent the phenotype of being fully expressed. Specifically we discussed age-related phenotypic expression, penetrance and expressivity. We provided examples of traits that show such phenomena.

We also started chapter 5, on polygenic inheritance and multifactorial traits.

We highlighted the difference between continuous and discontinuous phenotypic variation, and defined complex, polygenic and multifactorial traits.

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