In humans, the ability to taste a particular chemical is determined by a dominant allele, T. Individuals who are homozygous recessive (tt) cannot taste the chemical. Two hundred college students were tested and 8 were found to be non-tasters. Assume that the student population is in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.
Calculate the frequency of both alleles in this population.
Calculate the frequency of homozygous TT students in the population.
The allelic frequency of t is represented by the q term and the allelic frequency T is represented by the p term. To calculate the value of q, realize that qq or q2 represents the homozygous recessive individuals or the individuals who cannot taste the chemical in this case. Since there are 8 non--tasters,
the frequency of non-tasters = # individuals recessive/total individuals=8/200=0.04
q2=0.04
q= 2=0.2
since, p+q=1
p+0.2=1
p=1-0.2=0.8
The frequencies are, q=0.2 and p=0.8
The frequency of homozygous TT is given by p2
p2=0.8X0.8=0.64
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