Gene

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A gene is a hereditary unit consisting of DNA that occupies a spot on a chromosome and decides a trait in an organism (living thing). Half of a person's genes come from the mother. The other half come from the father.

Genes are passed on from parent to child and are an important part of what decides the biological properties (how they look and act) of offspring (children). Genes affect the way our bodies work, including how we look. So our eye, hair and skin color is caused by genes. It is said that genes cause genetic effects in our bodies.

Sometimes, a gene is 'dominant'. Sometimes, it is 'recessive'. What this means is that some genes have a better chance of showing up in a child. For example, let's say a mother has brown hair and a father has red hair. Brown hair is more common than red hair, so usually, the brown hair gene is going to be dominant and the red hair gene is going to be recessive. The dominant gene has a better chance of making it to the child, so if these parents have a child, it will probably have brown hair. But sometimes, the recessive gene makes it to the child. The child may have red hair.

A recessive gene might stay hidden for many generations. Let's use the parents from last example. But, the mother's mother (the grandmother) has blonde (yellow) hair. This gene did not show up on the mother because the mother has brown hair. But, the child might have blonde hair! This is because the blonde gene was recessive in this family, but came back a generation later. This explains why a person might look different from their parents, but look like their grandparents or great grandparents.

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