During an experiment, a scientist crosses a pea plant that has purple flowers with a pea plant that has white flowers. The plants that result from this cross in the F1 generation have both purple and white flowers. What can the scientist conclude?
A. White flowers are dominant over purple flowers.
B. Neither purple flowers nor white flowers are dominant.
C. The plants in the P generation were not true-breeding.
D. All the plants in the F2 generation will have purple flowers.
Answer (3)
The plants in the p generation were not true breeding. If they were, all of the flowers in the F1 would be purple or white, depending on which was dominant. You would then see an appearance of the recessive phenotype/genotype in the F2 generation.
The observation that F1 generation of the cross between purple and white flowered peas resulted in plants with both colored flowers suggests neither trait is dominant; this is possibly a case of codominance or incomplete dominance. ;
The best conclusion is that the plants in the P generation were not true-breeding, which is option C. This is evident because the F1 generation exhibited both purple and white flowers. Thus, the parent plants must have had different genetic backgrounds contributing to the observed traits.
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