Question

practice: eye color
what is the genotype of the mother?

Explanation:

In genetics, the genotype of an individual refers to the combination of alleles they possess. The father has a genotype of \( bb \) (homozygous recessive as indicated by blue eyes). Looking at the offspring genotypes: when crossed with the mother, half of the offspring have \( Bb \) (brown eyes) and half have \( bb \) (blue eyes). For the mother to contribute a \( B \) allele (since the father can only contribute \( b \) alleles) to produce \( Bb \) offspring and also a \( b \) allele to produce \( bb \) offspring, the mother must have a heterozygous genotype. A heterozygous genotype means having two different alleles (\( Bb \)) for a particular gene.

Answer:

heterozygous