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Heterogametic

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Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior

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Synonyms

Heterozygous chromosomes

Definition

Heterogametic means nonuniform distribution of sex-chromosomes in an organism.

Heterogametic

Heterogametic describes presence of different types of sex chromosomes in an organism. Heterozygosity is mostly associated with sex chromosomes than autosomes and plays a key role in sex-determination among organisms. For example, in case of human beings, XY chromosomes define a male sex while XX chromosome represents a female sex. Sex chromosomes are present as single copy in an organism and complement the gene product quantity through dosage compensation or the meiotic silencing (Forsdyke 2000; Johnson and Lachance 2012). Sex chromosomes show strong impact of evolutionary processes (mutation, selection, genetic drift, and meiotic drive) and play an important role in natural phenomenons like hybrid incompatibility and speciation. Besides animals and birds, heterogametic chromosomes are occasionally observed in plants also (Johnson and Lachance 2012)....

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References

  • Ellegren, H. (2011). Sex-chromosome evolution: Recent progress and the influence of male and female heterogamety. Nature Reviews of Genetics, 12, 257–266.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IMS Engineering College, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh, India

    Meghna Singh Dhaka

Authors
  1. Meghna Singh Dhaka
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Correspondence to Meghna Singh Dhaka .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Oakland University , Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Jennifer Vonk

  2. Department of Psychology, Oakland University Department of Psychology, Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Todd Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. Centre for Neural and Cognitive Sciences, School of Medical Sciences, University of Hyderabad, 500046, Hyderabad, Telangana, India

    Akash Gautam

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© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG

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Dhaka, M.S. (2017). Heterogametic. In: Vonk, J., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_12-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_12-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

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