What are mitochondria and chloroplasts?
Organelles of energy conversion which are semi-autonomous
What are genetic characteristics of these organelles?
Carry their own DNA whose size and gene content varies from species to species. The organelles are dependent on
nuclear genes to carry out their functions
What does the widely accepted endosymbiont theory propose?
Mitochondria
and chloroplasts evolved from bacteria engulfed by the precursors of
eukaryotic cells. Organelle genomes have lost genes over evolution, or
transferred them to the nuclear genome
What do organelle genomes in most organelles show?
Uniparental inheritance, mainly through the maternal line
Are genomes evenly partitioned at mitosis?
No
What are cells with a mixture of organelle genomes
Heteroplasmic
What do mutations in mitochondrial genes cause?
Several well-described human diseases which display non-Mendelian (cytoplasmic) inheritance patterns
