Genetics Vocabulary List

Here is a list of vocabulary terms that you might find useful when studying the chapters on genetics (Chapters 13-17 are listed here). All answers can be found in your textbook. The list may look long and daunting, but most of the terms will be much easier to remember after we go over the topics in class.

Chapter 13- Meiosis and Sexual Life Cycles

Gene
Asexual reproduction
Sexual Reproduction
Clone
Life cycle
Somatic cells
Karyotype
Chromosome
Homologous chromosome
Sex chromosome
Haploid
Diploid
Fertilization
Syngamy
Zygote
Meiosis
Alternation of generations
Sporophyte
Gametophyte
Synapsis
Chiasmata (singular=chiasma)
Independent assortment
Crossing over

Chapter 14-Mendel and The Gene Idea

Character
Trait
Monohybrid
Dihybrid
P generation
FX generation (x=1, 2, etc)
Test cross
Allele
Locus
Dominant
Recessive
Homozygous
Heterozygous
Phenotype
Genotype
Incomplete dominance
Codominance
Multiple alleles
Pleiotropy
Epistasis
Polygenic inheritance
Norm of reaction
Multifactorial characters
Pedigree
Carrier
Cystic Fibrosis
Sickle Cell Anemia
Huntington’s disease
Amniocentesis
Chorionic villus sampling

Chapter 15- The Chromosomal Basis of Inheritance

Chromosome theory of inheritance
Thomas Morgan
Drisophila melanogaster
Linked genes
Sex linked genes
Wild type
Mutant
Genetic map
Sex chromosome
Hemizygous
Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy
Hemophilia
Barr body
Nondisjunction
Aneuploidy
Trisomy
Polyploidy
Duplication
Translocation
Inversion
Down syndrome (Trisomy 21)
Genomic imprinting

Chapter 16- The Molecular Basis of Inheritance

Frederick Griffith
Transformation
Oswald Avery
Bacteriophage
Hershey & Chase
Erwin Chargaff
Double helix
Hydrogen bonding
Ribose
Deoxyribose
Adenine
Thymine
Guanine
Cytosine
Messlson-Stahl
Semiconservative model of DNA replication
Origin of replication
Replication fork
DNA polymerase
Parallel and anitparallel strands
3’ end
5’ end
Helicase
Single Strand Binding Protein
Promoter
Primase
Ligase
Leading strand
Lagging strand
Okazaki fragments
Mismatch repair
Nuclease
Excision repair
Telomere
Telomerase

Chapter 17- From Gene to Protein

One gene-one enzyme (polypeptide) hypothesis
Auxotroph
Beadle and Tatum
Transcription
Translation
Messenger RNA (mRNA)
Pre-mRNA
Primary transcript
Template strand
Triplet code
Codon
TATA box
Promoter
Transcription factor
RNA polymerase
Transcription initiation complex
5’ cap
Poly (A) tail
RNA splicing
Small nuclear RNA (snRNA)
Introns
Exons
Spliceosome
Ribozyme
Domains
Transfer RNA (tRNA)
Anitcodon
Wobble
Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase
Ribosomal RNA (rRNA)
P site
A site
E site
Large and small ribosomal subunits
Start codon
Stop codon
Polyribosomes
Peptide bond
Signal peptide
Point mutation
Base pair substitution
Missense mutation
Nonsense mutation
Frameshift mutation
Mutagen
Ames test