Question

If an individual has a recessive phenotype for a given trait, then the genotype of the individual would be

• A. always heterozygous
• B. always homozygous
• C. both homozygous and heterozygous at a time
• D. unpredictable

Answer 1

The correct option is B always homozygous

The phenotype refers to the external traits that the organism displays.

It is controlled by various enzymes that get encoded by our genotype.

An individual can have homozygous or heterozygous genotype for a particular trait depending on the composition of alleles.

However, according to the law of dominance, only one of the alleles is expressed in a dissimilar pair of alleles (heterozygous genotype), which is called a dominant allele.

Hence, the recessive allele does not get expressed if present in combination with dominant allele in an individual.

Hence, an individual with a recessive phenotype has to be homozygous for both the alleles.