Question

Pegasus is one of the best known creatures in Greek mythology that is part horse and part bird. A cross between a blue female Pegasus and a white male Pegasus produces offspring that are silver. The color of Pegasus is determined by two alleles, HB for blue and HW for white.

What type of inheritance is this an example of?

Option 1) Incomplete Dominance
Option 2) Codominance
Option 3) Recessive Inheritance
Option 4) Dominant Inheritance

Answer 1

The color inheritance in Pegasus offspring is an example of incomplete dominance because the silver offspring reflect a blend of the parent's blue and white colors, rather than one color being dominant over the other.

Step-by-step explanation:

The inheritance pattern described in the question is an example of incomplete dominance. In this type of inheritance, neither allele is completely dominant over the other, resulting in a phenotype that is a blend of the two parent phenotypes. When a blue female Pegasus (HBHB) is crossed with a white male Pegasus (HWHW), the offspring are silver, indicating that neither the HB allele for blue nor the HW allele for white is completely dominant. Instead, the offspring have a combination of the two alleles (HBHW), leading to the silver color which is a mix of blue and white. This blending of parental traits is characteristic of incomplete dominance.

A Punnett square can help to visualize this inheritance pattern. In a Punnett square involving incomplete dominance, the heterozygous genotype results in the blended phenotype, different from either of the homozygous phenotypes. This is unlike complete dominance, where the heterozygous genotype expresses the dominant phenotype, and codominance, where both alleles are expressed equally in the heterozygote.