Question

A peach breeder has an orchard of peach trees with an average fruit mass of 30 g. The breeder selects the top 10% of plants to reproduce for the next generation. The selected plants have an average fruit mass of 45 g. The next generation has an average fruit mass of 36 g. a) What is the narrow-sense heritability for fruit weight in this orchard

Answer 1

The narrow-sense heritability for fruit weight in this orchard is approximately 0.84.

Step-by-step explanation:

Narrow-sense heritability estimates the proportion of phenotypic variation attributable to genetic factors that are directly transmitted from parent to offspring. We can calculate it using the following formula:

Narrow-sense heritability = (Phenotypic variance of parents - Phenotypic variance of offspring) / Phenotypic variance of parents

Here, we need to calculate the phenotypic variances for the parent and offspring generations:

Parent phenotypic variance: (45 g - 30 g)^2 = 225 g^2

Offspring phenotypic variance: (36 g - 30 g)^2 = 36 g^2

Now, we can plug these values into the formula:

Narrow-sense heritability = (225 g^2 - 36 g^2) / 225 g^2 = 0.84

Therefore, approximately 84% of the variation in fruit weight in this orchard can be attributed to genetic factors directly inherited from the parents. This indicates that the selected parents successfully passed on their genes for heavier fruit, but other environmental factors may also have influenced the average fruit weight in the next generation.

Answer 2

A peach breeder has an orchard of peach trees with an average fruit mass of 30 g. The breeder selects the top 10% of plants to reproduce for the next generation. The selected plants have an average fruit mass of 45 g. The next generation has an average fruit mass of 36 g. a) What is the narrow-sense heritability for fruit weight in this orchard

From the analogy, it shows that the weight is reduced as crossing continues in the fruit mass, this could be attributed to different factors

Step-by-step explanation: