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AP®︎/College Biology
Course: AP®︎/College Biology > Unit 5
Lesson 1: Meiosis and genetic diversityChromosomal crossover in meiosis I
Meiosis is a process where germ cells divide to produce gametes, such as sperm and egg cells. In prophase I of meiosis, chromosomes condense and homologous recombination takes place, leading to genetic variation through chromosomal crossover. This forms a tetrad, which is made up of four chromatids (two sister chromatids per chromosome). Created by Sal Khan.
Want to join the conversation?
- I posted this on another episode, but it seems appropriate here too.
For anyone who's confused about the difference between centromere, centrosomes, and centrioles, I looked up the word roots, and here is the list:
Centr- (prefix) means center.
-mere (suffix) means part of, or segment
-ole (suffix) means small parts.
-some (suffix) having specified quantity, or a group.
So Centromere means center-part, Centrosome means center-group, and Centriole means center-small part. I hope this helps, it helped me.(20 votes) - In, it seems like 'tetrad' means just homologous pair of chromosomes. Does 'tetrad' mean any homologous pair of chromosomes or homologous pair of chromosomes that are crossed over? 6:58(11 votes)
- Tetrad or bivalents form when duplicated chromosomes, each composed of two identical chromatids, pair up and complete the process of crossing over.
Homologous pair of chromosomes that are crossed over. - that is tetrad.
https://www.reference.com/science/tetrad-form-prophase-1-meiosis-9d6739b7d11eed05(15 votes)
- If no cross-over took place will genetic variation increase during meiosis?(7 votes)
- No. Crossover INCREASES genetic variation in gametes and offspring.
Crossover allows the chromosomes you pass to your children to have some genes from your mother and some from your father. Without crossover each chromosome you passed to your offspring would either be exactly the same as the one from your mother or exactly the same as the one from your father.(14 votes)
- I've been under the impression that meiosis is the process by which 4 gametes are formed from a diploid cell within an organism through reduction division (gametogenesis). I thought this happens before fertilization... How is it then that chromosomes from the father and mother cross over during meiosis already?(8 votes)
- Meiosis scrambles the genetic information from the individuals parents.
So, a "maternal" chromosome means a chromosome that the individual producing the gametes got from its mother.
(Similarly, a "paternal" chromosome refers to a chromosome that the individual producing the gametes got from its father.)
The exchange of information between homologous chromosomes (through crossing over) happens during meiosis I when the maternal and paternal chromosomes associate to form tetrads.
Note also that while meiosis directly produces gametes in some organisms§ (e.g. most animals), in other organisms (e.g. plants) the haploid cells produce multicellular "organisms" that then produce the gametes.
Does that help?
§Note: For a discussion of the different types of sexual life cycles you should find this Khan Academy article helpful:
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/biology/cellular-molecular-biology/meiosis/a/sexual-life-cycles(10 votes)
- I know this is a little off topic, but how do things like eye colour change as time passes? Like, my friend had blue and brown eyes when she was younger, but now they are just brown. I used to have grey eyes that occasionally looked greenish, but now they are blue. Is this an actual thing that genes can do, or is it just an idea fed by our imagination?(5 votes)
- The change in eye color would likely be explained by a change in epigenetics, how your cells read and express your genes. It is unlikely (though possible) that significant changes happened in your DNA. It is more likely that environmental factors are affecting how the cells in your eyes express the same underlying genes. Epigenetics is a fascinating and continuing area of research.(12 votes)
- Why only the long chromosome and not the short chromosome overlaps?(6 votes)
- The short chromosome can overlap too, it's just that he used an example of how crossing over can occur.(11 votes)
- How do the chromosomes come together during Prophase I at around? I can't imagine that it would be something about the chromosomes themselves... Thanks in advance for anyone answering! 6:20(9 votes)
- Great question!
This is still being actively studied, but it does seem to depend (at least in part) on comparing the sequences of the chromosomes.
Specifically pairing appears to (usually) depend on recombination, which typically occurs between similar sequences.
Reference:
https://cshperspectives.cshlp.org/content/7/6/a016626.full(4 votes)
- So after Interphase happens in the Germ Cell that has a Diploid number of chromosomes (46), so the number of chromosomes double to make 92? If so, what is the term for that amount of 96 chromosomes. (Haploid = 23, Diploid = 46, ? = 92)(8 votes)
- When the chromosomes duplicate during interphase the genetic material is doubled but it is still considered to have the same number of chromosomes (46 in a human). This is because the duplicated chromosomes remain attached at a centromere and are referred to as sister chromatids. The duplicated chromosomes are considered one chromosome until they are pulled apart during anaphase.(7 votes)
- How often do chromosomal crossovers happen?(7 votes)
- Every first meiotic division (when prophase I happen).(3 votes)
- At, Sal says "has one chromosome from each of its parents." Why is there only 1 chromosome from each of its parents and not a chromosome pair from both? So that means technically there are four different chromosomes right? 1:00(5 votes)
- Exactly. That's why you and your siblings are so different. :)
Why they are not inherited in pairs?
Because it would create tetrads. If tetrads do not segregate the germ cells would easily be diploid and the embryo would be tetraploid - which is unbearable in humans. That kind of embryo is easily discarded and becomes a miscarriage.(6 votes)
Video transcript
- Let's now jump into understanding
meiosis in some depth. So let's start with the germ cell. As we mentioned already,
a germ cell is a cell that it can either go to mitosis
to produce other germ cells or it can undergo meiosis
in order to produce gametes. So this is a germ cell right over here. Let me draw the nuclear membrane. Let me draw the nucleus
larger because that's where we care a lot about the chromosomes in it. And let me draw a centrosome which will play a role later on. I wanna do that in ... Let's see, I'll do that
in this blue color. Each centromosome has
two centrioles in it. I just wanna clarify
some of the terminology. And in the mitosis videos, I focused on cells of an organism, I
just kind of made it up, that had two chromosomes, that
had a diploid number of two that had one homologous
pair, that had one chromosome from each of its parents. For this video, I'm
gonna focus on a species, not human beings, that would have 23 pairs or 46 chromosomes. I'm gonna focus on a species that has, that's diploid number is four. And so, let's say it has two
chromosomes from the father. And let me do that. I'll do that in this orange color. Now, I'll do that in the chromatin, I'll kind of depict the chromatin state, it's kind of unwound. So maybe it has a long one from the father and it has a short one from the father. And then it has homologous
chromosomes from the mother. So it would have the
long one from the mother and it would have the short one from the mother just like that. And obviously this is
a huge simplification but hopefully this
discuss the point across. So here, it has a diploid
number of chromosomes. So this is, let me write this down. This is diploid number is equal to, we have four chromosomes. And then this thing, this germ cell. Let me write this down. This is a germ cell right over here. It will go through interphase. So let me draw that. So it will go through interphase, in which it grows and it can replicate
its DNA and its centrosome. And so, let me draw that. So after it goes through interface, I wanna use my space
carefully because I have a lot of steps to go through. After it goes through
interface, I am going to have in my nucleus here, my DNA will have replicated. So this long chromosome from my father, now all the DNA will have replicated so it may look something like that. And it's attached at a centromere, All these centro words, at a centromere right here. But I'm still trying to draw it in kind of the chromatin state. It's actually all spread out. It's not bunched up so that
you can see it very clearly as these X's in a simple microscope. So it's just replicated. And after replicating, it
is still one chromosome. It has twice the genetic material but it is still one chromosome. That one chromosome is now made up of two sister chromatids. we talked a lot about
that in the mitosis video, but it doesn't hurt to reinforce because it can get a little bit confusing. And then you have that shorter
chromosome from the father and then that also replicates
into two sister chromatids attached at a centromere. So these are still two
chromosomes from the father. It has twice the amount
of DNA but it's containing the same information, just duplicate versions
of that same information. And the same thing's gonna
happen from the mother. You had that long
chromosome from the mother, homologous to this right over here. It's going to replicate. So it's now going to be
two sister chromatids. And then you have a short
strand from the mother that was homologous to
this one from your father. And that's also gonna replicate. And so, it's like that. And at the end of interface, it would actually all be spread out. Once again, it won't be
bunched up into these clearly discernible X's. I drew them a little
bit that way, otherwise, because you would have trouble
seeing how that replicated. And we also have replicated our centrosome as we've gone through interphase. Now, we are ready. In fact, now we are ready for
either mitosis or meiosis. But as I said, the focus of this video is going to be meiosis
so let's do some meiosis. So the first phase, so the first several
phases we call meiosis I. And the beginning of
meiosis I is prophase I. So let's see what happens in prophase I. So prophase I. And so, let me draw the
cell right over here. So prophase I. A couple of things happen. The nuclear membrane begins to dissolve. This is very similar to prophase when we're looking at mitosis. So the nuclear envelope
begins to dissolve. These things start to
maybe migrate a little bit. So these characters are trying
to go at different ends. And the DNA starts to
bunch up into kind of its condensed form. So now I can draw it. So now I can start to draw it as proper. So this is the one from the father right over here. And this is the one from the mother. And I'm drawing, I'm
overlapping on purpose because something very interesting happens especially in meiosis. So it's the mother right over here. Let me see. Let's now do the centromere in blue now. That's the centromere. Now this is the shorter
ones from the father. These are the shorter
ones from the mother. And actually, let me just do
draw them on opposite sides just to show that they don't have to, the ones from the father aren't always on the left hand side. So this is the shorter
one from the father. They couldn't be all on the left hand side but doesn't this all they have to be. And this is the shorter
one from the mother. And I will draw this overlapping
although they could have. Shorter one from the mother. And once again, each of these,
this is a homologous pair, that's a homologous pair over there. Now, the DNA has been replicated so in each of the chromosomes
in a homologous pair, you have two sister chromatids. And so, in this entire homologous pair, you have four chromatids. And so, this is sometimes called a tetrad. So let me just give
ourselves some terminology. So this right over here is called a tetrad or often called a tetrad. Now, the reason why I
drew this overlapping is when we are in prophase I in meiosis I. Let me label this. This is prophase I. You can get some genetic recombination, some homologous recombination. Once again, this is homologous pair. One chromosome from the father that I've gotten from the father. The species or the cell got
it from its father's cell and one from the mother. And they're homologous. They might contain different base pairs, different actual DNA, but
they code for the same genes. Over simplification, but in a
similar place on each of these it might code for eye
color or I don't know, personality. Nothing is that simple in how tall you get and it's not that simple
in DNA but just to give you an idea of how it is. And the reason why I
overlapped them like this is to show how the
recombination can occur. So actually, let me zoom in. So this is the one from the father. Once again, it's on the condensed form. This is one chromosome made
up of two sister chromatids right over here. And I drew the centromere, not to be confused with centrosomes. That's where they are, those
sister chromatids are attached. And then, I will draw the homologous chromosome from the mother. So the homologous
chromosome from the mother just like that. Homologous chromosome from the mother. And the recombination can occur at a point right over here. So after you're done
with the recombination, this side might look
something more like this. So let me draw it like this. So, they essentially break up and they swap those little sections. There's one way to think about it. So this one, we'll now have a
little piece from the mother. It might code for similar genes. But now it contains the
mother's genetic information. And then this one over here will now have the piece. And you could say even
homologous piece from the father. Let me do these two centromeres. And this is really interesting. All the time, there
couldn't be recombination and often times it can lead to
kind of non-optimal things, nonsense code and DNA. It might lead to a nonfunctional organism. But this happens fairly
common in the meiosis and it's a way, once again,
to get more variation. We've talked about sexual
reproduction before. And sexual reproduction
introduces variation into a population. And this, obviously, when different sperms find different eggs that
introduces variation. But then, even amongst homologous pairs you can actually have exchange
between this chromosome. And that's interesting
because as we mentioned, each of these chromosomes, they code for a bunch of different genes. And a gene is kinda
looking code for a specific or a set of proteins. So this right over here, and this is what I'm about
to say is gonna be huge over simplification. Maybe right over here
you coded for eye color or it was related to, or it
helps code for eye color. And then you got that from your dad. And here, it helped code for eye color. And you got that from your mom. Your mom might have trended
you towards a lighter eye color and your dad might have trended you towards a darker eye color. But now, the one from your
mom is on this chromosome, this gene, and then the one or they've both the same gene. They're just different allele. They're coding for different
variance of that gene. And then the allele from
your dad is over here. And once again, some people
get confused with genes and chromosomes and all of these. Each of these chromosomes
contain a bunch of genes. These are very long DNA molecules. This code for a bunch of different genes. So gene will be a little section
of here that could code for a particular protein. So that's what happens in prophase I. In prophase I, you have this condensation of your chromosomes, of
your homologous pairs. You can have this recombination. And it's really interesting,
this recombination doesn't tend to happen
at just random points that would kind of break
the genetic information. It tends to happen at fairly clean points. And the places where this
breakup is happening, these are called the plural, if you just talk about
one point, it's a chiasma, or if you're talking about
the plural, it's chiasmata. Sounds like it could be a horror movie. So, chiasma. Chiasma. And the fact that they happen, they tend to happen fairly
cleanly, this is once again, kind of the beauty of
the universe or at least of biology is that through billions of years of evolution,
these things have kind of optimized for more variation and to happen in fairly clean ways. So I'm gonna leave this video right there. I know I just got to prophase I. But this was a really,
really important idea of this homologous recombination
or this chromosomal crossover that we see right over here. And then from there, we can continue through the rest of meiosis
I and then meiosis II.