genes - new born babies

[gaz_farr]

My partner is preganant and due in 9 days.
She is naturally blonde with blue eyes (her dad is blond with blue eyes and her mom is a red head with brown eyes)

I have dark brown hair with blue eyes (my dad who is half italian has the same as me and my mom has slightly lighter brown hair with blue eyes)

Are there scientific odds as to what our child will have. I can remember in school talking about eye colour and x & y chromosones and that.

just curious although i know it's not important

[Peter Pedant]

Well the child will be blue-eyed when they are born because all of them are.

I think eye colour is autosomally iinherited, and not on the XY chromosomes, and brown is dominant and blue recessive. Each parent is blue eyed and so that is bb and bb and it looks as though the children all have to be blue eyed, chance is p = 1

Hair is different - red is inherited at another place to the others. Also very fair headed children can be well erm frankly mousey hair coloured in middle age.

[Peter Pedant]

youre not talking about cats, are you ?
Arent all tabbies, male and infertile ?
so obviously even in mammals, colouring can be widely differently inherited.

[shammydodger]

In A level biology, eye colour is taught purely on the basis of dominant/recessive genes. The suggestion is that you can predict what eye colour should be produced from a male/female combination.

Unfortunately, it aint that simple. Dominance/recessiveness for eye colour can't be boiled down to saying blue willl give blue etc. So, don't go jumping to conclusions and throw the baby out with the bath water!

[Loosehead]

depends on the genes that get passed on at conception. Brown is the dominanat gene so if it exists at all, say from Grand parents or even great grand parents and the right combination is present 2 blue eyed people can have a brown eyed baby.

[Tim123]

That's the wrong way round, Loosehead.

If both parents have blue eyes, they must each have inhereted the blue gene from both of their parents, otherwise the brown gene would dominate and they would have brown eyes. That means that two blue eyed parents must always have blue eyed children.

Two brown eyed parents might well both have one blue gene and one brown one, in which case you would expect one child in four to have blue eyes.

[Loosehead]

no trueTim, I don't know the precise details but the q was asked a couple of weeks ago and it was determined that 2 blue eyed parents are not guarenteed to produce a blue eyed baby.

[shammydodger]

Tim123

I refer you to my earlier post. It aint that simple. There is more than one allele in operation for eye colour. There are plenty of couples in the world, both with blue eyes, with children whose eyes are not blue. That can't be explained by the simple bb x bb punnet square.

[Betty Boop x]

It all sounds very complicated!

I have brown eyes, neither my mom or dad OR their parents have brown eyes, they all have light eyes - blue or green.

So I really don't think you can predict the eye colour of the a baby.

I don't know any scentific reasons behind it, but obviously someone somewhere in my family had brown eyes and the gene has only just been passed to me.

Not that I am complaining - I love my eyes :)

x

[janetsflower]

I have got blue eyes as had both my parents, my husband has brown eyes as had both his parents. Our son has blue eyes.
I have dark brown hair as had both my parents, my husband had black hair, his parents had one dark brown, one black, our son has dark blond, very light brown hair.

I reckon your baby will be born fair haired but will develop a red tinge and will have blue eyes.

Not all babies are born with blue eyes either, that is just a myth, plenty are born brown eyed but some born blue eyed change to brown

[dawkins]

what's to rule out a mutation betty?

[susan6540_0]

I have brown eyes as does my mum, my dad has green eyes. I agree with Janetsflower, both my sister and I were both born with dark brown eyes and apparently my mum got quite a fright when I first looked up at her as she also thoguht all babies were born with blue eyes!!

[susan6540_0]

I have brown eyes as does my mum, my dad has green eyes. I agree with Janetsflower, both my sister and I were both born with dark brown eyes and apparently my mum got quite a fright when I first looked up at her as she also thought that all babies were born with blue eyes!!

[Presario]

You can both be blue eyed and have a green eyed baby as green is recessive to both blue and brown. So if you both have blue eyes you may have a blue gene and green gene. I f both parents have this gene combination they could both pass the green gene to their child hence having a green eyed child. A bit hard to explain but I know what I mean lol

[Nummy]

try this site...

http://museum.thetech.org/ugenetics/eyeCalc/ey ecalculator.html

[chazza]

Brown is the dominant gene, therefore if it is present in either parent, they will have brown eyes. You both have blue eyes so therefore you don't have any brown genes to pass onto your children.

Therefore you will have a blue eyed child as you have no brown genes (colour of grandparents eyes is completely irrelevant)

[janetsflower]

No chazza thats wrong - my eyes are blue and my husbands eye are brown but my sons eyes are blue so brown can't be dominant. Well i know its supposed to be but it isn't always

[shammydodger]

Chazza

Oh dear, oh dear!

[chazza]

I dont think you understand Janetsflower, someone with brown eyes (ie your husband) can have one blue and one brown gene, with the brown gene always being dominant. Then your husband and you can both pass a blue gene to your son. As there is no dominant brown gene, the childs eyes will still be blue.

Just because someone has brown eyes doesn't mean they only have brown genes

[shammydodger]

Chazza

And you are incorrect with your first post that two blue-eyed parents will (always) have a blue-eyed child. As I and others have already said, it aint that simple, despite what may be taught in school biology lessons.

[hihi]

well y not jimmy boy