On heredity in relation to disease : the Harveian Oration for 1908, delivered before the Royal College of Physicians of London on October 19th, 1908 / by J.A. Ormerod.

  • Ormerod, J. A. (Joseph Arderne), 1848-1925.
Date:
1908
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: On heredity in relation to disease : the Harveian Oration for 1908, delivered before the Royal College of Physicians of London on October 19th, 1908 / by J.A. Ormerod. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ON HEREDITY IN RELATION TO DISEASE 29 a pure breed all the gametes carry one of the characters, to the complete exclusion of the other, while in a half-breed half the gametes carry one character and half carry the other. Mendel made his classical experiments on plants ; they have been repeated by other observers, not only with plants, but Avith many forms of animals, e. g. insects, snails, poultry, pigeons, rats, mice, rabbits ; and many characters have been studied from this point of view. One result may be quoted as specially interesting to physicians. It is that when a certain species of wheat which is very sus¬ ceptible to the ravages of a fungus which causes rust, is crossed with another species which is not susceptible, the immunity to rust which reappears in the resulting strains of wheat distributes itself in the Mendelian proportion. This suggests the possibility that something of the same sort may hold with respect to our own susceptibilities to disease, and raises the very questions which interest us most. For we want to know whether Mendelian laws are applicable to