Why do You Look the Way You do?

If you are a black cat then that is your phenotype. The phenotype is black. Phenotype is what the organism looks like or has. It is the result of the expressed dominant gene.

However, you might be a black cat because both your alleles are dominant black genes. Or maybe you have one dominant black gene and one recessive white gene. Or maybe you were made up from two recessive genes but they were both black. So, we can see that although you are a black cat there can be more than one way of you becoming a black cat.

The identification of the actual alleles that make you up gives rise to the genotype.

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