Flower color in primrose plants is controlled by an individual gene. The sudden appearance of one white flowering primrose in a plant breeder's field of red primrose plants is most likely due to mutation. <span>A mutation represents the permanent alteration of the nucleotide sequence of the genome of an organism in this case DNA of the plant. Mutation can potentially lead to the inactivation of some enzyme involved in the biosynthetic pathway of the pigment.</span>
A mutagen changes the level of mutations that occur in the DNA either by affecting it physically or chemically. This helps researchers create different organisms with altered phenotypes according to what the research needs so that the genes can be investigated further under a controlled environment.
