Question

additional details were added for this assignment.

which phenomenon would she hypothesize accounts for the pattern she sees?

respiration
cytokinesis
crossing - over

Explanation:

• Respiration is a metabolic process for energy production and not related to genetic outcome patterns.
• Cytokinesis is the division of the cytoplasm in cell division and not relevant to genetic ratios.
• Crossing - over is a genetic phenomenon where homologous chromosomes exchange genetic material. In this case, the deviation from the predicted 1:1:1:1 ratio (if it were independent assortment) to a ratio with more of two genotypes (RrGg and rrgg) and fewer of the other two (Rrgg and rrGg) can be explained by crossing - over. If the genes were linked (on the same chromosome), without crossing - over, we would expect a 1:1 ratio of parental types. But crossing - over can produce recombinant types (Rrgg and rrGg in this case), but if the crossing - over frequency is low, the parental types (RrGg and rrgg) would still be more abundant.

Answer:

crossing - over