![]() ![]() Red hair: Red hair is a whole different ball game and is classified as an “ incomplete dominance,” meaning it’s neither dominant nor recessive. Helpful, right? Genetics are weird.īlonde hair: Blonde is a recessive trait, and a blonde-blonde pairing would result in blonde offspring. In a black-brunette pairing, the child will likely have black hair, but could end up with a shade of brown. In a brunette-brunette pairing, your offspring will likely have a shade of brown. In a blonde-brunette pairing, there is a chance for a blonde child, though the odds are more in favor of a brunette child. It is non-blending with lighter colors, meaning if you or your partner have black hair, odds are your offspring will have black hair.īrown hair: Being brunette allows for a little more flexibility, but this is based off what unexpressed alleles both parents are carrying around, and how many shades of brown there are. Keeping in mind that determining hair color isn’t quite this easy, in general, here’s how these common scenarios play out between our dominant and recessive hair color genes:īlack hair: Black hair is both the most common hair color worldwide, and is typically the dominant trait. There are several forms with varying severity, affecting about 1 in 18-20,000 people in the US.Īgain - all of this is being simplified for the sake of brevity, but you get the jist. If there's some sort of genetic mutation or defect of the genes that produce melanin, albinism - where little to no melanin is deposited in the hair, skin, or iris - can result. People who only have a little brown eumelanin have blond hair. Eumelanin gets broken down even further into brown eumelanin and black eumelanin - each of which are responsible for the corresponding shade of brown or black hair. Pheomelanin is responsible for red tones in hair, as well as the skin, lips, and even freckles. It’s also worth mentioning pheomelanin and eumelanin, which are melanin pigments responsible for coloring black, brown, and red hair. That all said, predicting a baby’s hair color is more complex than a mini-genetics lesson can explain, partly because hair color can blend, and the final color can change as your child ages. Not everything they pass along is expressed, but we still have the ability to pass these traits on to our children.Įye and hair color is an example of how the dominant and recessive alleles you and your partner are carrying around can combine to create unique traits, like dark hair, dimples, blue eyes, or even a widow’s peak - even when these traits aren’t expressed by either parent. ![]() ![]() Each of our parents contributes portions of their DNA via their chromosomes that then become our own genetic code. To answer that, we’re going to need a mini-genetics lesson. It doesn’t take much to ripple the pond, though, which is where things like dominant and recessive genes, alleles, phenotypes, pigments, and blending come into play. Sure, you can always draw a genetic wildcard, but for the most part, if your entire family has one hair color, the odds suggest that your baby will come out with whatever the fam is rocking. However, genetics will sometimes have a surprise in store.For some, the big reveal will be pretty anticlimactic. However, we now know that a child’s eye color depends entirely on genetics.īy looking at the eye color of the parents, grandparents and great grandparents, it is possible to predict what color a baby’s eyes will be. The human eye comes in a broad and beautiful palette of colors. What does your child’s hair and eye color depend on? Eye color Meanwhile, the mother also gives the child half of her genes, as well as a place for these first few cells to grow into a baby.Ĭhance determines which characteristics come from the mother’s side of the family and which come from the father.īelow, we’ll look at some of the factors that determine your child’s hair and eye color. The father provides half of his genetic heritage in his sperm. Some of these combinations are responsible for our hair and eye color.Ī baby’s genetic makeup is in place from the moment of conception. This is what makes every child different from their brothers and sisters. There are billions of possible combinations, some more likely than others. These genes will stay with the child throughout their lifetime, and one day, they’ll pass some of them on to their own sons and daughters. These influence the color of our hair and eyes, the shape of our nose and our ears, and many other characteristics.Įvery one of a newborn’s features is passed down by their parents in the genes that they themselves inherited from the child’s grandparents. We’re all born with a set of genes passed down by our parents. In this article we’ll take a look at the factors that determine our children’s hair and eye color. ![]()
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