Question

Fruit flies have a diploid number of 8, and honeybees have a diploid number of 32. In which case will crossing over have greater impact on genetic variation? A. Genetic variation is likely to be greater in fruit flies. B. The number of chromosomes does not affect crossing over. C. Genetic variation is likely to be greater in honey bees.

Answer 1

The correct option is A.

Explanation:

As we know that genetic variation that result from crossing over depend on the number of genes and their alleles. When there are more genes in genome the chances of polymorphic loci will increase, which will result into more genetic variation during crossing over.

Forexample:

Drosophila melanogaster is a common fruit fly having diploid number of 8 chromosome composed of 122,653,977 base pairs, and about ~17,000 genes. Honey bees have diploid number of 32 chromosomes composed of approximately 2360000 base pairs, and 10,000 genes.

Conclusion:

As fruit fly genome contain more genes and polymorphic loci, so genetic variation is more likely to be greater in fruit fly.