prepotency

American  

[pree-poht-n-see] / priˈpoʊt n si /

noun

Genetics.

1. the ability of one parent to impress its hereditary characters on its progeny because it possesses more homozygous, dominant, or epistatic genes.

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prepotency British  

/ prɪˈpəʊtənsɪ /

noun

1. the state or condition of being prepotent

2. genetics the ability of one parent to transmit more characteristics to its offspring than the other parent

3. botany the ability of pollen from one source to bring about fertilization more readily than that from other sources

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Etymology

Origin of prepotency

1640–50 for general sense “predominance”; < Latin praepotentia. See prepotent, -ency

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

prepotency

As Rockefeller’s oil prepotency waned, global production flourished; in a frantically developing industrialized world, oil reserves took on strategic importance.

From Slate ● Nov. 22, 2013

When we consider latent characters, the explanation of this form of prepotency will be obvious.

From The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) by Charles Darwin

But if there were no prepotency, the two species would blend; and this Kerner supposes must actually take place wherever two previously separated species, thus physiologically circumstanced, happen to be brought together.

From Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol 3 of 3) Post-Darwinian Questions: Isolation and Physiological Selection by George John Romanes

We have now to consider the bearing of what is called "prepotency" on the theory of physiological selection.

From Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol 3 of 3) Post-Darwinian Questions: Isolation and Physiological Selection by George John Romanes

The prepotency of the sire is apparent at the first glance, and to so marked an extent that the illustration would pass muster anywhere as having been drawn from a full-blood buffalo.

From The Extermination of the American Bison by William Temple Hornaday