Epistatic vs Hypostatic genes

Epistasis is a phenomenon in genetics in which the effect of a gene mutation is dependent on the presence or absence of mutations in one or more other genes, respectively termed modifier genes. In other words, the effect of the mutation is dependent on the genetic background in which it appears. A hypostatic gene is one whose phenotype is altered by the expression of an allele at a separate locus, in an epistasis event. Example: In labrador retrievers, the chocolate coat colour is a result of homozygosity for a gene that is epistatic to the “black vs. brown“ gene. Some genes mask the expression of other genes just as a fully dominant allele masks the expression of its recessive counterpart. A gene that masks the phenotypic effect of another gene is called an epistatic gene; the gene it subordinates is the hypostatic gene. #Epistatic #Hypostatic #gene #allele #locus #geneExpression