Concept explainers
Explain why human offifuing resemble their parents but are not identical to them.
To explain: Why human offspring are similar to their parents but they are not identical to them.
Introduction: Heredity is the process of the transmission of traits or heritable information to the next generation in the form of DNA. Humans reproduce sexually. During sexual reproduction, the genetic information from both the parents gives a unique gene combination in the offspring. The offspring resemble their parents but are somewhat different in their genetic makeup, which explains the genetic variation.
Explanation of Solution
Humans undergo sexual reproduction and inherit one chromosome of each homologous pair of chromosomes from each parent. Each somatic cell in humans consists of 46 chromosomes, which are two sets of 23 chromosomes each (maternal and paternal set).
During sexual reproduction, most of the variation arises during fertilization and meiosis. During meiosis, the homologous chromosomes randomly align with their homologs at metaphase I. According to the law of independent assortment of chromosomes, each daughter cell shows either maternal or paternal chromosome combinations. Thus, there is a 50% chance that the offspring gets maternal or paternal chromosomes or a combination of both. Secondly, crossing over forms the recombinant chromosomes that consist of a unique combination of genes in the offspring. The next aspect is random fertilization, which could be between any male gamete and female gamete. These factors relate to the fact that the offspring resemble their parents but are not exactly identical.
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