Family Pedigrees
- Family pedigree diagrams are usually used to trace the pattern of inheritance of a specific characteristic (usually a disease) through generations of a family
- This can be used to work out the probability that someone in the family will inherit the genetic disorder
Interpreting a family pedigrees
- Males are indicated by the square shape and females are represented by circles
- Affected individuals are red and unaffected are blue
- Horizontal lines between males and females show that they have produced children (which are shown underneath each couple)
- The family pedigree below shows:
- both males and females are affected
- every generation has affected individuals
- one family group that has no affected parents or children
- the other two families have one affected parent and affected children as well
A family pedigree chart
