I need help understanding this question and answering it, my exam is in two days
Kia ora Sarah
Apologies for missing this question!
Must have slipped through with all the barrage of emails that was coming through.
While your exams have finished, I hope the answer from here will help you with your future understanding in Biology next year!
Let’s unpack the resource information first:
It states that coat color shows incomplete dominance and multiple alleles.
Incomplete dominance means that neither alleles are dominant over each other and the presence of both results in the expression of an intermediate phenotype.
Multiple alleles are when you have more than 2 alleles (with different types of possible inheritance) for a gene. In this example, both complete dominance and incomplete dominance will be considered. So the C allele is completely dominant over the chinchilla (grey) allele and albino (white) allele.
We’ll start with the LEFT column
(2x Heterozygous black fur)
Black fur rabbits must at least have the C allele. Since they are heterozygous, both must be “C C(ch)” - I can’t use the superscript here so I’ll put it in brackets. (Refer to diagram below)
The type of inheritance would therefore be complete dominance, as the C allele is dominant over the C(ch) allele.
Resulting in this PS cross.
For the RIGHT column:
(Cross between 2x heterozygous rabbits for chinchilla and albino)
This means the genotype for both parents must be “C(ch) C” and their phenotype must be grey. (This is the only possible allele combination for the parents to be heterozygous.)
Refer to PS below:
This pattern of inheritance is incomplete dominance.
Apologies again for the delayed reply. Hopefully your exams went well!