Question

Give Weismann's theory of germplasm. What light does it throw on Lamarckism?

Answer 1

In the germplasm theory, inheritance in a multicellular organism only takes place by means of the germ cells: the gametes, such as egg cells and sperm cells. Genetic information cannot pass from soma to germplasm and on to the next generation. This is referred to as the Weismann barrier. The foundation of the germplasm theory of Weismann in 1892 directly gave a death blow to the Lamarckian concept of inheritance of acquired characters. He regarded that every individual in bisexual forms starts its life from the zygote formed by the fusion of male and female gametes.