Answer: If a husband and wife who are both carriers of the sickle-cell anemia allele (Ss) but do not have the disease decide to have a child, the offspring can be Normal (SS), carrier (Ss) or sick (ss) with the probability ¼, 2/4 (½) and ¼ respectively.
Explanation: If the mother contributes the dominant allele and the father also contributes the dominant allele, the genotype of the child will be SS. The probability is ¼. This means there is a 25% chance that a randomly selected offspring will be a normal child and will not have sickle-cell anemia.
If the mother contributes the dominant allele and the father contributes the recessive allele, the genotype of the child will be Ss. The probability is 2/4 or ½. This means there is a 50% chance that a randomly selected offspring will be a carrier of sickle cell anemia, but will not have sickle-cell anemia.
If the mother contributes the recessive allele and the father also contributes the recessive allele, the genotype of the child will be ss. The probability is ¼. This means there is a 25% chance that a randomly selected offspring will have sickle cell anemia.
Check attached image for illustrations.
