In: Biology
What is epistasis? What is the difference between dominant epistasis and recessive epistasis?
Epistasis occurrs when one allele of a gene masks the expression of alleles of another gene.
When there is no epistasis a dihybrid cross (two characteristics) of two heterozygote individuals (each individual has one of each allele) results in a phenotypic ratio or 9:3:3:1 (both dominant : first dominant, second recessive : second dominant, first recessive : both recessive).
Recessive epistasis:
The epistatic allele is recessive, so for it to mask the other gene two copies are needed. To illustrate, dihybrid cross with a homozygous dominant individual and a homozygous recessive individual is carried out and a ratio of 9:3:4 (dominant both: dominant epistatic, recessive other:recessive epistatic) can be seen.
Dominant epistasis:
The epistatic allele is dominant, so only one copy is needed to mask the other gene. If the same cross as for recessive is carried out, a ratio of 12:3:1 (dominant epistatic: recessive epistatic, dominant other: recessive both) is obtained.