Inheritance mechanisms - principles of genetics

Timetable

Module aim (aims)

This course will place special emphasis on heredity and variation, the mechanisms governing genetic inheritance, Mendelian and non-Mendelian genetic analysis and application of knowledge and skills in practical activities.

Pre-requisites in terms of knowledge, skills and social competences (where relevant)

Basic knowledge of cell biology and genetics, group work skills.

Syllabus

Week 1: Introductory lecture: laws of inheritance, non-Mendelian inheritance, allelic and non-allelic interactions.Week 2: Lecture: Sex-linked inheritance: sex–linked traits and sex- influenced traits, mechanism of sexdetermination.Week 3: Lecture: Mutations – classification, mechanisms of spontaneous and induced mutations, repair, role in genetic analysis and evolution.Week 4: Lecture: Cytoplasmic inheritance – basis and mechanism, role of organellar genes.Week 5: Lecture: Quantitative inheritance – concept, genes and environment - heritability, penetrance and expressivity.Week 6: Seminar: Deviations from the Mendelian inheritance: types of dominance, lethal alleles, complementation, epistasis – presentation and discussion.Week 7: Seminar: Sex determination in plants, animals and human - presentation and discussion.Week 8: Seminar: Drosophila melanogaster as a model organism for genetic analysis and for human genetic disorders (e.g. Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, Alzheimer’s diseases etc.) – presentation and discussion on the selected papers.Week 9: Seminar: Genetic experimental design: planning, data generation, data analysis, preparing final report.Week 10: Laboratories: Basics of setting up Drosophila crosses experiment: breeding conditions, life cycle, gender recognition, types of mutants.Week 11: Laboratories: Dihibrid crosses experiment on a Drosophila and maize models.Week 12: Laboratories: Inheritance of sex-linked traits – Drosophila crosses experiment.Week 13: Laboratories: Gene complementation - Drosophila crosses experiment.Week 14: Laboratories: Cytological preparation of polytene chromosome in larval stages of Drosophila.Week 15: Seminar: module summary, presentation of experiment reports.

Reading list

Winter P.C., Hickey G.I, Fletcher H.L. Instant notes in genetics. BIOS Scientific Publishers, 2012.Khanna P. Essentials of genetics. I. K. International Pvt Ltd, 2013.Klug. Concepts of genetics. Pearson Education, 2002B. A. Pierce. Genetics. A conceptual approach. 2017