Welcome to Mr. Zlatnik's Fruit Fly Page!
In this page, you will find out about the fruit fly experiments of Thomas Hunt Morgan. These experiments helped determine a variety of different genetic theories, revolutionizing the biological field forever.
(From The Random House Encyclopedia edited by James Mitchell and Jess Stein Random House Inc. 1990)
'Morgan, Thomas Hunt: (1866-1945), US geneticist, b. Lexington, Ky. He was one of the most important founders of the science of genetics. In 1907 Morgan made an important advance-the use of the Mediterranean fruit fly Drosophila as a tool for genetic research. He went then on to discover that chromosomes were the carriers of hereditary material. He was awarded the 1933 Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine.'
(From Webster's New World Dictionary Third College Edition Edited by Victoria Neufeldt & David Guralink Simon & Schuster, Inc. 1988)
'Mediterranean Fruit Fly: a small, gall-forming, two-winged fruit fly (Ceratitus capitata) whose larvae infest and feed on many kinds of fruit.'
( Much of the information taken from Biological Science: A Molecular Approach BSCS Blue Version Seventh Edition edited by Ceanne Tzimopoulos & Rosemary Previte D.C. Heath 1996)
The experiment was conducted by Morgan to understand linked genes, or genes found on the same chromosome that are inherited together. Morgan began to form an interest in fruit flies while working at Colombia University. He began to mate flies in the laboratory. The third generation of flies (F2) had a 3;1 ratio of red to white eyes (for every four flies their were three with red eyes and ones with white). Only the male flies had white eyes (but not all males had white). He figured that this must be related to the sex of the fly. He breeded the flies some more and finally created a female fly with white-eyes. He proceeded to mate white female with a red male. The second generation (F1) didn't all have red eyes. Only the females carried the dominant red trait. The males all had white eyes. Morgan said then that the eye color gene was on the X chromosome, while the Y carries nothing. This is referred to as an X-linked trait.
male (red eyes) + female (white eyes)= 50% chance female (red eyes) 50% chance male (white eyes)
female (red eyes)+male (white eyes)= 50% chance female (red eyes) 50% chance male (white eyes) 25% chance female (red eyes) 25% chance male (red eyes)
male (white eyes)+female (red eyes)= 50% female (red eyes) 50% male (red eyes)
male (red eyes)+female (red eyes)= 50% chance female (red eyes) 50% chance male (white eyes) 25% chance female (red eyes) 25% chance male (red eyes)
(Also from Webster's)
'chromosome: any of microscopic rod-shaped bodies formed by the incorporation of the chromatin in a cell nucleus during mitosis and meiosis: they carry the genes that convey hereditary characteristics, and are constant in number for each species.'
This page was created by Brian (me likes bananas) Heater for Mr. Zlatnik's Honors Science 10 class.
Thank You