X chromosome Genetics.
Also † x chromosome.
[X 3 e.]
A chromosome with different morphology and properties from others in the complement, now recognized as a sex chromosome occurring in both sexes of a species, man and other mammals having one in the somatic cells of the male and two in those of the female.
| [1902], 1911 [see X 3 e]. 1933 R. H. Wolcott Animal Biol. lxxiii. 537 In fowls and in moths females have either one x-chromosome or both an x-chromosome and a y-chromosome, while the males have the two x-chromosomes. 1961 P. Gray Encycl. Biol. Sci. 232/1 In most species of Spiders there are two different kinds of X-chromosomes but no Y, so that the males have X1X2 and the female X1X1X2X2. 1966 Lancet 24 Dec. 1397/1 The small size of the Y chromosome relative to the X chromosome has been attributed to the gradual loss of genetic material not concerned with sex determination. 1983 M. B. Zaleski et al. Immunogenetics ii. 36 The X chromosome carries a set of genes that determines a wide variety of traits that do not necessarily affect the sex of the organism. |