LIFE IN HARRY POTTER'S WORLD, wizards are bom, not made. Just look at Harry. He was raised from infancy by two muggles (normal, magic-less people)., Uncle Vemon and Aunt Petunia Dursley. They couldn't pull a rabbit from a hat, let alone use a Cheering Charm to bring some happiness into their mean little lives. If Harry didn't pick up his magic skills from the adults who raised him, where did his powers come from? From his parents, of course, the witch Lily Evans and the wizard James Potter. In the same way that tall children tend to have tall parents, the wizard children in J. K. Rowling's fiction seem to have magic parents. That's not the case for Hermione Granger, however. Both of her parents are muggles, yet she is one ofthe best students at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. If children derive their magic powers from their parents, where did Hermione's magic come from? Is there any logic in the world of wizards? Yes, say genetics researchers in Australia. Last sum- mer, they published a letter in the science journal Nature contending that wizarding could have a genetic basis. Their theory is as fanciftil as a flying broomstick, but Harry's world can still teach us something about how people inherit different characteristics, says Jeff Craig, a geneticist at the Royal Children's Wizard or muggle- Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. could the chances of GENETIC BULLIES Geneticists call the characteristics becoming one lie in that we inherit from our parents traits. Traits, such as eye color and hair color, a person's genes? are determined by long stretches of DNA called genes. Every person has two By Chris Jozefowicz versions of each gene, one inherited from Dad, and one from Mom. Sometimes the two versions are identical. Sometimes they are different and are termed alleles. Two brothers can have different eye colors because each brother inherited a different set of alleles from their parents. Harry and What's more, some alleles, called dominant alleles, Hermione might have have a stronger effect on traits than other, weaker alleles, acquired which are called recessive alleles. Craig likens the situa- their magic tion to a schoolyard. "The dominant ailele is a bully," he powers from says, "and if there is a bully around, the recessives are put different in their place. But when there is no one to pick on them, genetic heritages. when there is no bully around, the recessives can express themselves."

HARRy, HERMIONE, HEREDITy Craig, together with education researchers Renee Dow and Mary Anne Aitken, suggests that wizardry arises from a recessive ailele (w) that gives people magic powers. The muggle version (M) ofthe same gene is a dominant ailele. Only a child who inherits one wizard ailele from each parent (ww) can become a wizard. If the child inherits two muggle alleles (MM), he or won't have magic powers. MUGGLES IN THE MIX Punnet squares are used to chart possible inheritance patterns. The alleles of each parent are displayed at the top and the side ofthe square. Each box represents a possible pairing of alleles in a child. For Hermione Granger to become a wizard, her parents had to have this square:

Hermione's mother

^ M (muggle allele] W (wizard altetel

^ M MM Mw (A "qj (muggle aitele) muggle muggle c o wM ww Iwtzard alfele) muggle wizard

Every child from twoMw parents has an equal chance of getting a muggle or a wizard allele from each parent But because the muggle allele is dominant, there are three

chances of producing a muggfe and only one chance of Harry's Aunt Petunia, pictured here with Uncle Vemon producing a wizard. Therefore, on average, only one of four and their vile offspring, Dudley, is the sister of Harry's children (or 25 percent) would be a wizard. mother. Could she carry the gene for magic powers? Could Dudley?

Because both of Harry's paretits had magical powers, disease that causes a buildup of thick mucus in the lungs each one must have had two recessive alleles (ww). They that leads to breathing problems. It arises when a child could have passed on only recessive genes to Harry, inherits two recessive alleles, one from each parent. destining him to become a wizard. Hermione's inheritance is more complex, because HOGWARTS OR HOGWASH? both her parents are muggles. Craig says Hermione's One month after Craig's letter appeared. Nature pub- parents must both be carriers of the wizard allele. A car- lished a response from a trio of researchers in plant rier has a recessive allele and a dominant allele—in this genetics at the University of Cambridge in England. case., a w and an M. Each of Hermione's parents would They disagree with the Australian team's notion. "We still be a muggle because muggleness is dominant and believe the assumption that wizarding has a genetic overpowers wizarding. But the Grangers could make a basis to be deterministic and unsupported by available magic child by passing on two recessive alleles to their evidence," they wrote. child. (Sec "Muggles in the Mix.") The Cambridge group complains that if wizarding In real life, certain diseases, such as cysticfibrosis, is determined by recessive alleles, it should have turned are inherited in a similar manner. Cystic fibrosis is a up more often in the Granger family pedigree—the family's ancestral line. "As Rowling fans could point out," the Cambridge researchers wrote, "Hermione's parents were muggle dentists who lack any family history of wizarding." But Craig says researchers don't always find a family history of disease in real-life medical conditions that arise from two recessive alleles. "In many ofthe pedi- grees, the ancestors don't show a single case," he says. "Two different recessive alleles just happen to come together in a particular generation." The alleles are not only recessive but also rare. The Cambridge researchers also have a more general complaint. They think Craig's idea is deterministic—that it takes a complex trait like wizarding and assumes without Gene evidence that it must have a simple genetic explanation. Perhaps wizarding arises from the interaction of many genes and various environmental influences. The supeHong DNA molecules in the nucleus of each "I think that's a valid point," Craig concedes. "We cell in the human body are coiled in structures called chromosomes. Segments ofthe DNA molecules are have to beware ofthe attitude of determinism. But temied genes.They number about 25,000 in human I think it depends on how serious you want to take it. DNA and help determine the body's various traits. We think they were being a bit too serious there."CS

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