Image credit: livescience.com (Shutterstock).

By Dr Tushar Chauhan October 17, 2022

What is Genetics? What does it study?

Genetics is a field of biological science, that specifically studies genetic material (DNA or RNA), and related alterations and abnormalities.

Image credit: National cancer institute from Unsplash.

Genetic studies DNA, RNA, gene, chromosome, genome, mutations, epigenetics, phenotypes and genotypes. Let’s see each one by one.

Image credit: WangXiNa on Freepik.

Genetic studies DNA, its structure, function and related alteration. DNA is a nucleic acid and a genetic material.

Image credit: WangXiNa on Freepik.

DNA

Genetic studies RNA, its structure, function and how it forms proteins. It’s also a type of nucleic acid and genetic material of retrovirus.

Image credit: science.org.

RNA

Genetic studies genes which are functional pieces of DNA. It helps to understand how protein forms from a gene.

Gif credit: Teno

Gene

Genetic studies chromosomes, their structure and function. Structural studies help to understand how abnormalities occur by genetic factors.

Image credit: National cancer institute

Chromosome

Genetic studies a genome. Genomic studies let scientists understand the nature of complex diseases and abnormalities.

Image credit: Pixabay.

Genome

Genetic studies mutations. Any alteration in a DNA is known as mutation which is directly associated with an abnormal phenotype.

Image credit:Image by kjpargeter on Freepik

Mutation

Genetic studies also include epigenetic evaluation which allows one to understand the pattern of gene expression.

Image credit: National cancer institute

Epigenetics

Genes by the influence of environmental factors cause abnormalities, produce mutations or alter gene expression patterns. 

Image credit: www.wallpaperaccess.com

Gene-Environment interaction