Red Hair Recessive Or Dominant

Although hair color is dependant on dominant and recessive qualities predicting hair color is more complex than predicting other genetic traits.

Red hair recessive or dominant. Hair color in general is really complicated and poorly understood with the exception of red hair. Like red hair left handedness is a recessive trait. Red hair is caused by a mutation in the melanocortin 1 receptor.

Dark hair is dominant but your aunt and uncle are likely heterozygous for dark hair with one dominant dark hair gene and one recessive light hair gene. Red hair is not actually a recessive gene like blonde is but is rather an incomplete dominant in the world of genes there are dominant genes which take over any recessive gene brown black recessive genes blonde which will be taken over by any dominant gene or incomplete dominent genes red. Redheads are thought to be more sensitive to pain too.

If your cousin received both recessive genes for light hair then it would be possible for the effects of the red hair gene to be visible. It is most common in individuals homozygous for a recessive allele on chromosome 16 that produces an altered version of the mc1r protein. Many cases of red hair can happen by the simple dominant recessive model i ll discuss below.

Rather than one or the other hair color is additive meaning the pigment melanin along with a variety of genes determines how dark your hair will be. People who have recessive traits like blue eyes or red hair are always homozygous for that gene. Red hair or ginger hair occurs naturally in one to two percent of the human population appearing with greater frequency two to six percent among people of northern or northwestern european ancestry and lesser frequency in other populations.

The recessive allele is expressed because there isn t a dominant one to mask it.