Mendelian inheritance is a way of understanding how characteristics are passed from parents to offspring, based on the work of Gregor Mendel in the 1800s. Mendel experimented with pea plants and observed that traits such as flower colour and seed shape were inherited in predictable patterns. He proposed that inheritance is controlled by "units", one from each parent. These “units” are now known as genes, and different versions of them are called alleles. Mendel showed that some traits are dominant and others recessive. Mendelian inheritance helps us predict the chances of inheriting certain traits and is an important part of understanding genetics.
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