Question

State and explain the law of independent assortment with a suitable example.

Answer 1

1. The law of independent assortment states that when two parents differing from each other in two or more pairs of contrasting characters are crossed, then the inheritance of one pair of characters is independent of that of the other pair of characters.
2. For example, when a yellow round seed bearing pea plant is crossed with a green wrinkled seed bearing pea plant, 9 pea plants bearing yellow round seeds, 3 pea plants bearing yellow wrinkled seeds, 3 pea plants bearing green round seeds and 1 pea plant bearing green wrinkled seeds produced in $F_2$ generation.
4. From the above result in the image, it is obvious that the character of yellow colour of the seed in no way is linked with the round shape of the seed. Similarly, the green colour of seed is not linked with the wrinkled shape of the seed. This is due to the fact that in the above cross, the two pairs of characters segregate independently. In other words, there is independent assortment of characters during inheritance.