Inheritance Of Acquired Characteristics Flashcards, test questions and answers
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What is Inheritance Of Acquired Characteristics?
Inheritance of acquired characteristics is the idea that characteristics developed or acquired during an individual’s lifetime can be passed on to their offspring. It is part of a more general theory known as Lamarckism, which was first proposed by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck in the early 1800s. The most famous example of this theory is that giraffes have long necks because they stretched them out to reach high branches, and passed this increased neck length onto their young.The main argument in favor of inheritance of acquired characteristics is that it could explain why evolution occurs so quickly, since traits learned by individuals can be passed on to their descendents without going through generations of slow genetic changes. However, experiments conducted over the last century have shown that this type of heritable change is impossible. Changes made to an individual’s body or behavior are not passed down to subsequent generations because they are not encoded in the genes, which act as a blueprint for how an organism should develop. Despite its failure as an explanation for evolution, the concept of inheritance of acquired characteristics continues to be studied today due to its implications for epigeneticsthe study of how environmental factors can affect gene expression without changing the underlying DNA sequence. While these effects cannot be inherited across generations in the way proposed by Lamarckism, some epigenetic changes may persist and influence phenotype even after many generations have gone by. For example, studies have shown that starvation experienced by a fruit fly’s ancestors may lead to reduced fertility among its descendants up to seven generations later. In conclusion, although inheritance of acquired characteristics has been disproven as a mechanism for evolutionary change over time, it still has relevance today due to its implications for epigenetics and our understanding of how environmental factors can influence genetics across multiple generations.