The consequences of crossing-over in pericentric inversions in acrocentric chromosomes

Abstract

1. Chiasmata formed in a pericentric inversion ioop in an acrocentric bivalent give rise to the production at All of long and short metacentric chromatids which have one segment duplicated and one missing, also to acrocentrics which may or may not contain the inversion. 2. The metacentrics superficially resemble iso-chromosomes, but genetically they are not, the arms being homologous only in the distal regions. Observations of Gilel (1943), who proposed iso-chromosome formation at meiosis by a process of centromere misdivision and reunion are more readily interpreted as being due to a pericentric inversion. © 1970, The Genetical Society of Great Britain. All rights reserved.