Can offspring exhibit unique traits from parents without genetic mutation?

[gib65]

I was just wondering this because I would be a case in point. Neither one of my parents could program a computer if their lives depended on it, but I have an aptitude for computer science and it's what I've earned by degree in. Could it be that a combination of genes leads to unique phenotypes? If this usually doesn't happen, then I must have been adopted!

[Yggdrasil]

Yes. The easiest explanation is that of recessive traits, which causes a mutant phenotype (trait) only when a someone possesses two mutant alleles. For example, consider the heritable disease, cystic fibrosis. Let's call the wild type (normal) allele C and the mutant (disease) allele c.

 

If a woman who has the geneotype Cc marries a man with genotype Cc, netiher parent has cystic fibrosis since they both have one dominant wild type allele. But they could have a child with genotype cc, who would have cystic fibrosis even though neither parent had cystic fibrosis.

 

Of course, in the case of aptitude for computer science, it's unlikely that genes control that trait at all; it's likely the result of environmental factors (upbringing, education, etc.) primarily.

[Bluenoise]

I doubt there's a computer science gene...

[Mokele]

There's also recombination, the genetic shuffling of genes into new combinations.

 

And, while there probably isn't a CS gene, there probably *are* genetic factors that influence certain personality and cognitive traits that can result in being good at computers and programming.

 

Mokele

[AzurePhoenix]

It seems likely that at least one of your parents has the same trait, it simply manifested itself differently based on the environment they devloped in

[Bluenoise]

I doubt that your parents traits are that much dissimulair to yours in this respect. Having the ability to preform well in computer science is most like due to the combination of many many genes. The likely hood of such a feature being recessive is extreemly low.

This is mostly due to upbringing.

You parents generation just wasn't exposed to computers in the same way as you were.

 

I have a simular example in my family, me and both my parents are extreemly computer literate, but my grandparents can barley operate a mouse. Now my parents are just young enough to have worked with computers in university. (punch card stuff...) So they got exposed. Had they been a few years older they probably would have missed this early exposure.

[scientistsahai]

I was just wondering this because I would be a case in point. Neither one of my parents could program a computer if their lives depended on it, but I have an aptitude for computer science and it's what I've earned by degree in. Could it be that a combination of genes leads to unique phenotypes? If this usually doesn't[/i'] happen, then I must have been adopted!

 

 

Well the knowledge and learning are independent of the genes and genetic interactions. If u wud have been born and worked on Computers without learning then it cud b considered. But as rightly put up by 'Mokele' that certain combination of genes and environment affect the cognition and learning.

The fact that your children wud be much more comfortable with the mobiles, laptops and bluetooths does not suggest that your genes are superior/inferior.

 

Although a combination of genes might lead to the production of new phenotypes as in the classical pea experiment. But then the environmental and other factors were kept similar so as to minimize the effect on the progeny. Hence ur parents might have good logical and numerical skills that you wud have inherited and it has helped u master CS.