Suppose you discover two interesting rare cytological abnormalities in the karyotype of a human male. (A karyotype is the total
visible chromosome complement.) There is an extra piece (satellite) on one of the chromosomes of pair 4, and there is an abnormal pattern of staining on one of the chromosomes of pair 7. With the assumption that all the gametes of this male are equally viable, what proportion of his children will have the same karyotype that he has?
Karyotype may be defined as the visual appearance and the number of chromosome of the organism. Karyotype helps in studying the chromosomal abnormalites.
The human male has extra piece at chromosome 4. The abnormal pattern on the chromosome 7. The probability to inherit the defective chromosome 4 is 1/2, defective chromosome 7 is 1/2 and the probability of Y chromosome is 1/2. The probability of child to inherit all these chromosome is (1/2) × (1/2) × (1/2) = 1/8.
