Chapter category: Gene Expression

The Basis of Dominance

This chapter appears in the following book:

The Biology of Genetic Dominance

Edited by: Reiner A. Veitia
ISBN: 1-58706-288-7
» Get more information about this book at landesbioscience.com «

Chapter authors:
Athel Cornish-Bowden and Vidyanand Nanjundiah

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Dominance is the masking at the level of the phenotype of the presence of one of the two alleles at a diploid locus. We discuss whether it could be an automatic consequence of cellular physiology, as proposed initially by Wright and elaborated by Kacser and Burns, or whether it might be a consequence of natural selection having favoured it in the past, as argued by Fisher. With some exceptions, such as “supply-driven” processes, the physiological explanation is generally valid. At the same time, the extensive pleiotropy of gene action implies that the functioning of a locus can be influenced by many other loci. This means that selection can act on a secondary locus and affect the relationship between alleles at the locus of primary interest. Therefore in principle dominance could have evolved in the manner suggested by Fisher; but when considered in detail, the difficulties with his model imply that the physiological explanation is to be preferred at present.

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Chapter category: Gene Expression

The Basis of Dominance

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