You look more like mom or dad – you didn’t really inherit after 50 percent. decade

The answer depends on whether you are asking about all the genes that the child inherits from the father and the mother, or which of the genes from the parents has the greatest impact. Be that as it may, scientists believe the answer is not 50 percent, reports livescience.com.

Many people probably know that genes are fragments of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) that are found on 23 chromosomes in the form of X or Y. These autosomes are stored in the nucleus of the cell and the DNA information they have is obtained equally from both parents. It is true that there is another chromosome in cells that is hiding in the mitochondria.

Mitochondria, or “power plants” of cells, provide them with energy and play an important role in exercise and the aging process, as reported in 2011 in a review published in the journal Physiological Genomes. Mitochondria also have a piece of their own DNA that we inherit only from our mother.

“This is a clear example that you are more like your mother than your father,” said Marika Charalambous, a geneticist at the Royal College of London.

The results of some studies suggest that mitochondrial DNA (and therefore mothers) actually determines our athletic endurance. Spanish and Israeli researchers, for example, have taken a closer look at a mitochondrial gene associated with the use of oxygen in cells in sports. The authors of a paper published in the Journal of Applied Physiology in 2005 stated that a variant of the gene that caused lower endurance was much less common in professional cyclists and runners than in normal humans. The researchers’ study findings were confirmed by additional research. They have shown the importance of mothers in inheriting this and other genes. The researchers found that only a mother’s physical stamina could predict a child’s physical ability and it was not necessary to examine the father’s characteristics.

But instead of asking which parent passes on the most genes, ask which genes have a greater effect. Most of the differences in external people are not due to genes themselves, but to chemical “switches” that tell our bodies which part of the DNA to scan and produce the relevant proteins, and which to ignore, Live Science told Charalambous. “Human genetic differences are not just characteristics of the genetic sequence,” said the geneticist.

Due to so-called genetic imprinting, chemical switches completely passivate certain genes, but only if they come from a particular parent. These trends are passed down from generation to generation. For example, if the “A” gene has a paternal imprint, it will always be active, inherited from the mother, and it will always be passive, inherited from the father.

The results of many studies suggest that there are 100 to 200 genes imprinted on our body, but some scientists say there may be more, according to a 2012 article in the journal PLOS Genetics. These genes are especially important in the brain and placenta.

It is true that experts do not agree on whether this phenomenon changes gene expression in favor of one of the parents. Judging from the evidence gathered, the number of genes with a maternal or paternal fingerprint is roughly similar, said Andrew Ward, a geneticist at the University of Bath in England. “When it comes to traits that are responsible for genes with a paternal or maternal imprint, you will be a little more like one of your parents,” he explained. In other words, impressions can have several characteristics: from physical to sleeping habits and memory. However, there are relatively few genes with imprints, and there is likely a balance between the number of genes with paternal or maternal imprints, so this phenomenon does not make a child look strikingly like a father or mother, he said. Ward.

On the other hand, the results of the mouse studies suggest that parents have a slight advantage in this regard. 2015 Authors of a paper published in the journal Nature Genetics reported that they found that genes with a maternal imprint were 1.5 times more likely to be passive (with a father, 1.5 times more likely to be active).

The authors of an earlier study published in PLOS ONE in 2008 came to a similar conclusion. In the brain, most imprinted genes are active if inherited from a parent; in the placenta, if inherited from the mother. However, there is no evidence so far that the same imbalances are common in humans.

But even if the imprinted genes do affect the expression of the genes relative to either parent, this will not necessarily make the child more similar to the father or mother. After all, it’s very possible that the active gene in your body in your father’s or mother’s body is passive, said Edward Chuong, a genome biologist at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
“You could say that the expression of their genes was determined by their parents, but to say that the expression of their genes is similar to that of their parents would probably be wrong,” the genome biologist explained to Live Science.