Publisher's Synopsis
In this book I have endeavored to state and to explain the basic principles of biological inheritance and to show the importance of those principles to man, to the improvement of plants and animals, and to organic evolution. I have attempted to present this material in a simple fashion so that any reader can grasp the fundamentals of heredity in spite of limited biological training. However, I have also included some of the data that support these principles so that the student who wishes can acquire an adequate background for further studies in heredity, and I have added a fairly extensive bibliography so that the more serious student will have a diversified list of some of the items of the research literature should he wish more information on a subject than a book of this size can offer. Throughout this book I have stressed general principles rather than practical applications and have drawn my illustrations from both the Plant and the Animal Kingdoms. For the reader who is interested in human biology, references to inherited traits are numerous, and Chapters 3 and 19 should be of especial importance. The emphasis on principles and the variety of the illustrations should make this book of value to students of agriculture, psychology, and sociology. It should serve also as a foundation for advanced work in genetics and cytogenetics...
