Genotype / Phenotype distinction

HeartlandHank

Well-Known Member
I was reading on the distinction between genotype and phenotype, not related specifically to cannabis.

I was wondering... When one male plant polinates one female plant, do all of the resulting seeds share the same genotype? Care to explain more on that?
 

jcurtis912

Well-Known Member
So this is how it works. Genotype is something you typically cant see. Like for instance if two people make a baby, one with blue eyes, the other with brown eyes, they can possible have a child with green eyes if and ONLY if one of the parents carried the GENE for green eyes. Now that doesnt mean that it will be expressed in the offspring, but the offspring does carry the GENE/GENOTYPE in its code.

Now when those green eyes are expressed in that child, it is its PHENOTYPE, or simply how the GENES are expressed. Comprende?
 

polyarcturus

Well-Known Member
and to extend further a phenotype is an expression of a genotype. a genotype, even if expressed, is never considered a phenotype because it is the gene that cause the expressible trait.
 

echlectica

Well-Known Member
And a plant can be heterozygous or Homozygous and for any particular phenotype. The trait can be recessive or dominant and to determinethese thing you if you wish perform a test cross.
 

Apical Bud

Well-Known Member
The Phenotype is the trait that you observe (like brown eyes) that the genotype has the genes for. Your genes code for a trait that is to be expressed, and its expression is the phenotype. A genotype is to a sheet with music what a phenotype is to the song it "codes for" or plays. When you recognize the song it's like observing a phenotype. You wouldn't recognize a genotype if you saw it cause you'd have to be able to read genetic code. Your brain can't process that but the cellular machinery in your cells can. You can think of it like this: your cells read the genetic code of genes of the genotype you're talking about, and they translate it into the trait that you can observe and comprehend (the color of eyes, the dankness of bud, etc).

So that said, to address your question, which I believe is "Do all offspring of a male plant have within their genome the code for the phenotypes one can observe in the male plant?", I hate to say it but, not neccessarily but not unlikely. Buuuuuut, an organism only needs one half of its double helical dna strand in order to read the genes and express the phenes. If one parent passes on the code for a recessive trait but the other passes on the code for a dominant trait, and the two traits are coded for in the same locus (the locus is the location on the DNA strand where a phenotype is coded-for per the genotype), the dominant trait will be expressed (lets say from the mother's side) while the recessive trait will not be expressed because it's being over-written by the dominant trait. For example, in humans the blue eye trait is called a recessive trait because blue eyes are what happens when there is no dominant gene to code for brown-ness in eyes. Blue eyes are what human eyes look like if they lack the brown eye trait. But if either the father or mother passes on the trait for color, color is added to colorless-ness (the default, blank slate eye color is blue but most humans code for brown because it prevent sun-blindness) resulting in brown eyes. That's why the brown trait is called dominant - because it adds something, and always adds something. People with blue eyes don't have a gene for blue eyes they simply lack a gene for brown eyes.
How does this relate to mmj? Well if you're talking about simple dominant-recessive traits in mmj you have to keep in mind that if the male has a dominant phenotype, it's possible that its mother had recessive traits that that father's dominant traits over-wrote. This male plant could then express the dominant trait while retaining the recessive one. His offspring could then, if the female had the recessive trait in her genes, result in recessive phenotype children.
Let's say chromosome X codes for blue flowers, and Chromosome Y lacks coding for flower color and so is expressed as white pedals. Because DNA is double stranded, the coding for each gene of an organism contains a copy of one gene from the mother's gene at that locus and one from the father. So if you take a male, Juan, who has XY and is blue, and a female, Mary, who is XX and white, you can guess that one of Juan's parents passed him an X and one pass him a Y. Both Mary's parents passed her an X. If Juan and Mary mate and name their first seed Maryjuan-A, with one gene from each, the possibilities for marijuana's genotype would be XX, XX, XY, XY. Note that two of four offspring (on average) would have blue pedals, and two would have white, but if the blue children (let's call them Maryjuan-C and D) mated with a plant with XX, the result from that could still be XX, XX, XY, XY. If it mated with one of its blue siblings you'd get XY, YX, YY, XX. Three blues and one white.
Note that not all genes operate in the dominant recessive fashion. Goodwill yourself a biology book and check out the genetics chapter. It might be a dry read but it'll help out a lot and give you insight into what kinds of traits you can look for in mmj and which might be easy to breed.
I hope this helps :)
The genetics of it
 

Apical Bud

Well-Known Member
So, Genotype would be traits such as powdery mildew or mold resistance/vulnerability etc?
No actually, the phenotype would be the trait. The word Pheno means to show or exhibit or display, so think of it like Displayed-type instead of phenotype. The thing that is displayed, IE the trait that is pheno-ed is the phenotype. Flower development, mold resistance, the fact that a plant develops a root system, are all examples of the results of genetic coding (genotype) being translated into results (phenotype) that are coded for by the geneotype.
Hope that helps.
 
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