Question

this passage describes the shell banding trait in cepaea snails: cepaea snails live on land in many parts of europe. the shells of cepaea snails can have different colors and patterns. banded shells have dark bands, or stripes, that spiral around their surfaces. unbanded shells do not have bands. in a group of cepaea snails, some individuals have a banded shell and others have an unbanded shell. in this group, the gene for the shell banding trait has two alleles. the allele b is for a banded shell, and the allele b is for an unbanded shell. a certain cepaea snail is from this group. this cepaea snails phenotype for the shell banding trait is a banded shell. this snails genotype for the shell banding gene is bb. based on this information, complete the following statement. this cepaea snail is ________ for the shell banding gene. homozygous heterozygous

Explanation:

To determine the correct term, we recall the definitions: Homozygous means having two identical alleles (e.g., BB or bb), while heterozygous means having two different alleles (e.g., Bb). The snail's genotype is Bb, which has two different alleles (B and b). So it is heterozygous.

Answer:

heterozygous