Eye color is a unique feature that accompanies a person throughout his life. It is determined genetically and depends on many factors. Young spouses always want to know how to determine the eye color of the unborn child, and whether it is possible modern stage development of science. The answer is positive - genetics and statistics help to tell what shade of iris your son or daughter will inherit from you.
Eye color is determined by the amount of melanin pigment in the outer layer of the iris. In addition to the concentration of melanin, the number and thickness of the fibers plays a role connective tissue in the same layer of the iris.
What colors do people have eyes?
- Blue – little melanin, fibers intercellular substance thin;
- Gray – there is little melanin, but the connective tissue fibers are denser;
- Green - more melanin than blue-eyed, the quantity and quality of fibers may vary;
- Brown - the concentration of melanin is even greater, the characteristics of the fibers may vary.
There are two extreme options:
- Red – complete absence melanin, the shade is determined by the color of the blood flowing through the vessels (with albinism, the hair will also be white);
- Black – the maximum amount of pigment.
Parents often ask the question: “What is the most common eye color on the globe?” Researchers have found that the majority of the world's inhabitants are brown-eyed.
Dark eyes are typical for residents of warm regions and are more common among representatives of the Negroid and Mongoloid races. Light shades of the iris arose later in the process of evolution, when the ancestors of people began to settle in the northern territories of our planet.
The color of the iris can change throughout life under the influence of age, weather conditions, exposure physical factors and some diseases. The shade of the eyes is also influenced by a person’s mood, his general emotional condition and how many hours he sleeps. When we are happy or in love, the color of our eyes appears brighter to others.
Modern data suggest that a trait such as eye color is encoded by two genes located on chromosomes 15 and 19 - HERC2 and EYCL1. Each of them can be presented in two variants (alleles) - dominant and recessive. Every person has two copies of each gene, received from their mother and father.
| Mother's eye color | |||||
| Father's eye color | Children | Brown | Green | Blue | Grey |
| Brown | Brown eyes | Brown-eyed | Brown eyes | Brown eyes | |
| Blue eyes | Blue eyes | Grey-eyed | |||
| Green-eyed | Green-eyed | Green-eyed | |||
| Green | Brown-eyed | Green-eyed | Blue eyes | Green-eyed | |
| Green-eyed | Blue eyes | Green-eyed | Grey-eyed | ||
| Blue eyes | |||||
| Blue | Brown eyes | Green-eyed | Blue eyes | Blue eyes | |
| Green-eyed | Blue eyes | Grey-eyed | |||
| Blue eyes | |||||
| Grey | Brown-eyed | Grey, | Blue eyes | Grey-eyed | |
| Green-eyed | Green-eyed | Grey-eyed | |||
| Grey-eyed | |||||
If mom has brown hair and dad has blue
Let's consider the option when mom has brown eyes and dad has blue eyes. Such parents may give birth to children with brown eyes, or less often, the color of the child’s eyes will be green or blue.
If mom has blue ones and dad has brown ones
It happens that the mother has blue eyes, and the father has brown eyes. For similar spouses, the situation is similar to that described above (the child will have the same options for eye shade).
If mom is green and dad is brown
It happens that the mother has a green iris, and the father has a brown one. Their sons and daughters may have brown, green or rarely blue eyes.
If mom has brown, and dad has gray
Genetics indicate that if a woman is the owner brown eyes, and her beloved has gray eyes, then their descendants will inherit a brown or gray shade of the iris.
If mom's are green, and dad's are blue
A green-eyed woman and a man with blue eyes, probably the birth of children who will have green or green eyes blue color. Such parents cannot produce babies with dark eyes.
If mom has blue ones and dad has green ones
Medical consultants explain that if a spouse has green eyes and his life partner has a blue iris, then they will have the same children as their previous parents.
If mom has brown, and dad has green
Remember that a brown-eyed mother and a green-eyed father will give birth to babies with brown eyes, green or blue.
If mom's are gray, and dad's are green
What color will the babies' eyes be when the expectant mother has grey eyes, and dad’s are green? They should expect green-eyed or gray-eyed offspring.
What eye color will the child have?
Odds or percentage of probability
Mom and dad have brown eyes, three quarters of all children born will have the same shade of eyes. The likelihood that they will have a green-eyed or blue-eyed baby is much lower - 18.75% and 6.25%, respectively.
When the first parent has brown eyes, and the second has green eyes, then in half the cases such spouses can give birth to a brown-eyed baby. In 37.5% of cases, their son or daughter will have a green iris, and only 12.5% of the heirs will have blue eyes.
Heterochromia
Heterochromia is a rare natural phenomenon, which is called the presence different color eyes in one person, caused by heterogeneous synthesis of the melanin pigment. Heterochromia can occur both within one iris and in each eye separately.
In Medieval Europe, many people with no same color the eye was considered associated with other world. Nowadays, some politicians, actors and singers have this feature (Tim McIlroth, Alice Eve, etc.). Modern medicine It has been established that this condition most often does not pose a threat to the child’s life.
But parents need to be careful and, in case of any vision problems, show the baby with different eyes to an ophthalmologist, since heterochromia can be a companion to certain diseases (a genetic test may need to be performed).
If heterochromia appears in an adult, this is always evidence pathological process(inflammation, tumor, metabolic disorder, or injury) that develops in a part of the body.
How to determine eye color in newborns?
All people are born with blue or blue eyes. At what age can you see the real shade of a baby’s iris, and at how many months does a child’s eye shade change? Only after six months to a year of life on Earth does the child begin to develop the final color of the iris, which will remain for the rest of his life.
Permanent color of the iris is formed up to 2-4 summer age. In addition, teenagers can expect surprises during puberty, when changes in hormonal balance begin and sometimes eye color changes again.
The unique shade of the eyes is a miracle given to us by nature. Thanks to genetics, today future parents can not only imagine what eye color their future child will have, but also give birth to a beautiful, healthy baby.
Character by eye color
The color of a person's eyes depends on the pigmentation of the iris, which contains chromatophores with melanin. If there is a lot of pigment, the eyes turn out brown or hazel, and people have impaired melanin production. Behind light color the eye answers, which happened not so long ago - about seven thousand years ago. Gradually it spread, but the mutated gene is recessive, so there are many more people on the planet.
In a simplified form, the laws of inheritance can be described as follows: when a germ cell is formed, the human chromosome set is divided into two halves. Only one second of a person enters the cell, including one gene responsible for eye color. When two sex cells merge to form an embryo, genes meet each other: in the area responsible for eye color, there are two genes. They will remain in the genome of the new person, but will appear in the form external signs There can only be one - a dominant one, which suppresses the action of another, recessive gene.
If there are two dominant ones, for example, those responsible for brown eye color, then the child’s eyes will be brown, if there are two recessive ones, then they will be light.
Blue-eyed child with brown-eyed parents
Brown-eyed parents can give birth to a blue-eyed child if both have recessive genes in their genomes that are responsible for light-colored eyes. In this case, part of the germ cells gets the dominant, which manifests itself in the form of brown eyes, and the other part gets the recessive gene. If, during conception, cells with genes meet each other light eyes, then the child will have .
The probability of such an event is about 25%.
Much less common are situations where brown-eyed children are born to blue-eyed parents. From the point of view of the simplified laws of genetics described above, it is impossible to explain this: where could the dominant gene come from in the baby, if it does not appear in the parents, then it means they do not have it? And yet such cases exist, and geneticists easily explain this.
In fact, the principles of inheritance are much more complex than they seem. In humans, not one pair of genes is responsible for eye color, but a whole set in which genes inherited from many previous generations are mixed. The combinations can be very diverse, so you can never predict 100 percent what kind of eyes a child will have. Even scientists still cannot fully understand inheritance patterns: eye color can be influenced by a variety of genes in different parts of the chromosomes.
Each future mom awaits her baby with tenderness and trepidation. Who is there - a boy or a girl? Who will he look like - me or dad? What kind of character will there be, what kind of mind, what color of hair, what color of eyes?
Almost all people have at least once heard the common myth that the eye color of all newborns is sky blue. Actually this is not true. At this age, all babies actually have almost the same eye color, but it can be greyish, dull blue or bright blue. The amount of melanin pigment in infants is small; it increases during the first year of life, and it is the intensity of production that affects the final color of the child’s eyes.
This process is completed in all babies in due time, but in most cases a permanent color can be determined by the age of one year. However, the change in subtle shades in some cases lasts up to 3-4 years.
What determines the intensity of melanin production? Mainly from heredity. But you shouldn’t understand this too simply - the child’s eye color will not necessarily be the same as that of one of the parents or a mixture of their colors. It would be useful to educate a jealous and prejudiced spouse on this topic in order to avoid misunderstandings.
So, the color of a child’s eyes may differ from both the mother’s and father’s. But we can offer some guesses based on parental traits.
If both parents are brown-eyed, the child will be the same in 75% of cases. Green (20%) and blue (5%) eye colors are also possible.
If one parent is brown-eyed and the other is green-eyed, then in half the cases the child will inherit, 40% green and 10% blue.
Brown-eyed and blue-eyed parents will also receive a brown-eyed child in 50% of cases, the remaining 50% will have blue eyes, but green eyes in this situation most likely will not work.
Green-eyed parents will give birth to the same child in 75% of cases, in a quarter of cases the offspring’s eyes will be blue, and in the most incredible case (<1%) родится кареглазый ребенок.
A union of blue and green eyes is unlikely to produce brown-eyed offspring, and their colors will be distributed with equal probability (50%).
And finally, two blue-eyed parents have a 99% chance of getting the same child. In 1% of cases, they will have a baby with green eyes, and such a couple is unlikely to have a brown-eyed child.
There are some cases where this rule may not apply. Sometimes you meet people with an unusual appearance - their eyes are different colors. Although the times have passed when they were considered witches, supporters of the devil and were shunned in every possible way, such an appearance feature still surprises and attracts attention. However, it does not cause any damage to attractiveness.
The baby may be born an exact copy of you or, on the contrary, will not resemble you at all; he may have your husband’s eyes, your mother’s curls or your father’s freckles. Is it important? It is probably more important to do everything possible so that your child grows up as a happy and worthy person - this inheritance will be your main gift to him.
All future parents are burning with curiosity about what their long-awaited baby will be like. Are they worried about what kind of eyes the child will have: brown - like dad or blue - like mom? It turns out that color can be determined with some degree of probability based on research conducted in this area. There are certain indicators of how exactly this aspect of appearance is inherited from a scientific point of view. Moreover, it is worth considering that a baby will be born with one shade, and over time will change it to another.
With 90% confidence, scientists will tell you what kind of eyes children are born with - absolutely everything, without exception. With blue ones! Only the remaining 10 percent may have a different color, due to the individual characteristics of the body and heredity.
Up to 4 years of age (for some this happens earlier, for others a little later), the baby will develop his own eye color. Blue can darken to brown when exposed to sunlight, or it may simply take on a slightly different color. By the age of 4, the child has established the shade that will remain with him for the rest of his life. It can be brown, green, blue, amber and even dark red. Why is this happening? From a scientific point of view, there are several hypotheses on this issue.
It is very exciting and interesting to imagine what eye color your baby will have, just as it is interesting to watch the child’s growth and development. Regardless of eye color, all children are very active and inquisitive; they learn about the world around them, exploring it with their own hands.
Children are most active from two to five years old; at the same age, the peak of curiosity occurs, which sometimes ends with dirty, dirty palms and a head smeared with paint. Therefore, it is always worth remembering the child’s hygiene. But you should be extremely careful when choosing children's washing cosmetic products. Study the composition of the products. If you notice the presence of odium lauryl/Laureth Sulfate or CocoSulfate, it is better to return such a product to the shelf. Such substances are extremely dangerous and can cause various irritations.
Professionals advise using only natural cosmetic products, without dangerous impurities and preservatives. Many leading cosmetologists recommend natural products from the Mulsan Cosmetic company (mulsan.ru), created on the basis of natural ingredients, rich in vitamins and oils, and most importantly - without dyes and sulfates. Be more attentive to your health and the health of your child.
Scientific assumptions
For many years, geneticists around the world have argued over how a child’s eye color is inherited: what plays a leading role? The most convincing hypothesis was the one that based this inheritance on Mendel’s law, which also determines hair color. It says that dark genes are dominant. Those phenotypes that are encoded by them take precedence over those individual characteristics that are caused by light genes.
A hundred years ago, such great scientists as Darwin, Mendel and Lamarck described not only patterns, but also exceptions to this general rule. They determine the inheritance of most genes:
- Children born to dark-eyed parents are predominantly brown-eyed;
- the descendants of those with light shades (blue) will most likely inherit this distinctive feature of theirs;
- a child born to parents with different eye colors may have a shade between the parents', or will take the dark one, since it is considered dominant.
From this generalized dogma a whole science grew, which with maximum accuracy calculated the percentage indicating what color the child’s eyes will be inherited from his parents. If you know these scientific indicators, you can guess what your unborn baby will look like.
Chances
Based on the parents' appearance, we can say with a certain degree of certainty what kind of eyes the child will have. The percentage ratio has long been identified by scientists:
- brown + brown: 75% - brown, 18% - green, 7% - blue;
- brown + green: 50% - brown, 37% - green, 13% - blue;
- brown + blue: 50% - brown, green will never work, 50% - blue;
- green + green: 1% - brown (very rare), 75% - green, 24% - blue;
- green + blue: brown cannot be obtained, 50% - green, 50% - blue;
- what kind of eyes a child will have if his parents have blue eyes: brown will not work, 1% - green (one chance in 100), 99% - blue.
Now you can imagine your baby, even if he has not yet been born: according to Mendel's law, parents can determine the color of their child's eyes even before birth with the maximum degree of probability. There are also several interesting facts on this issue that will certainly interest many.
This is useful to know
By paying attention to the question of the eye color of their unborn child, parents can learn several interesting facts about this matter.
- Brown eye color is the most common.
- Green is the rarest (less than 2% of our planet's population has it). Most green-eyed babies are born in Turkey, while in the countries of Asia, South America, and the Middle East, green eye color is an incredible rarity.
- Blue eye color is very characteristic of Caucasian residents. Icelanders have a predominant color of green.
- Do not be alarmed if by the age of 4 your child has developed different eye colors. This rare phenomenon is scientifically called heterochromia. This is not a disease or pathology, but simply an individual feature of your baby - however, it is very noticeable and attracts attention. In certain eras, such people were considered almost saints and were worshiped, calling them the chosen ones. Heterochromia was noted in actresses Mila Kunis and Kate Besward, rock star David Bowie (although in him this phenomenon was acquired as a result of injury, and not congenital).
Now you can guess with some confidence what color your future baby's eyes will be. Remember that he will change throughout the first years of his life. And you will probably love him regardless of his appearance and even more so - the color of his eyes.
Each pregnant woman often thinks about who her baby will be like, what he will inherit from dad and what from mom. Future parents are especially concerned about the question of what color the child’s eyes will be if mom and dad have different eye shades. For example, if a father has blue eyes and a mother has brown eyes, what color might their child's eyes be?
Sometimes with parents It causes great bewilderment when a child is born with blue eyes, and both parents are brown-eyed. In this case, the new father may even experience causeless jealousy and look for ways to eliminate the possibility of another paternity. Meanwhile, in 90% of cases, children are born with blue eyes and only the remaining 10% may have a different color.
Changes eye color in newborns up to 4 years old, before this age the blue color may darken to brown or take on only a slightly different shade. But in any case, the color of the iris depends on heredity; most often, by the age of 4, the baby’s eyes become similar to one of the parents or close relatives.
It is a mistake to think that if both parents brown-eyed, then the child will definitely have brown eyes. The hereditary gene for blue eyes can be passed on through generations. Therefore, if the great-grandmother or great-grandfather were blue-eyed, then they can also contribute to the formation of the baby’s eye color.
Future parents are always interested in what traits the future baby will inherit, what kind of eyes the child will have, and who he will be more like. It is impossible to predict this with one hundred percent probability, because sometimes even brown-eyed mothers and fathers give birth to blue-eyed children. However, geneticists claim that a certain pattern exists. Parents just need to refresh their school knowledge about dominant and recessive genes and try to determine what eye color they should expect in their child.
Parents with brown eyes may have blue-eyed babiesWhat factors determine the color of children's eyes?
What determines the color of a child’s pupils? Our iris consists of many fibers adjacent to each other. The tightness of their fit determines the color of the eyes. In light-eyed people, the fibers are located close to each other. The back side of the iris of absolutely everyone has a dark tint.
- The bodies of blue-eyed men and women produce relatively small amounts of melanin. For those with dark blue pupils, the fibers are loosely spaced.
- The presence of a blue tint indicates that the fibers that make up the iris are of high density. They can be white or grayish. A similar fiber density is observed in gray-eyed people.
- If there is little melanin, the iris becomes green. Green color is formed by mixing golden-brown lipoid pigment and melanin. The lipoid pigment is responsible for the predominance of a yellow tint in those with honey and amber eyes.
- If melanin levels are high, your newborn baby's eyes will appear brown or black. In dark-skinned and black-haired people, the pupils literally absorb light.
We remember from biology course that the genes responsible for dark color are dominant. There are exceptions to every rule: brown-eyed parents may well have a baby with light eyes. Why is this happening? The fact is that a child can inherit the color of the iris from more distant relatives - grandparents. It is sometimes impossible to accurately predict the color of eyes, hair and skin. A special table will help you find out what eye color you should expect in your child.
Newborn albinos have a congenital absence of melanin pigment. The latter gives color not only to the skin and hair, but also to the iris and pigment membranes of the eyes.
The eye color of your unborn child largely depends on his ethnicity and even the natural and geographical location of the region of residence. For example, indigenous Europeans are born with gray-blue, blue and even violet eyes. Among representatives of the Mongoloid race, all children are born with brown or green eyes. Dark-skinned newborns most often have dark irises. For African Americans, the eye color of a young child and the eye color of his parents often match.
What eye color are most children born with, and when does it change?
The eyes of a newly born baby are most often blue or blue. This color scheme occurs in 9 cases out of 10.
When a baby is born and opens its eyes, the cells - melanocytes - begin to produce melanin. By the way, it is melanocytes that determine constitutional melanin pigmentation (skin tone). The number of these cells is determined by heredity.
Most babies' eyes acquire their final shade only when they reach one year, and not immediately after birth. Green and honey tones can take up to five years to develop.
Table for determining the color of a child's eyes from parents
Almost always, the eyes of newborns are blue, but there are exceptions (more details in the article:) Do not rush to determine the color of your child’s eyes based on the eye color of both parents, but use a special table for determining the shade, developed on the basis of statistical data. It is likely that a dark-eyed couple will give birth to a blue-eyed baby. If the parents have brown, green or blue eyes, what will the baby have?
The green color of a child's eyes develops closer to the second year of life. - 10 thousand years ago, all the inhabitants of the planet had brown eyes. Green, blue and gray shades are the result of mutation processes.
- In animals, the whites of the eyes are almost invisible, unlike in humans. Thanks to this feature, you can clearly see where the human pupil is looking.
- In Iceland, 80% of locals have blue or green eyes.
- Green eyes are considered the rarest. Only 2% of the world's population has green eyes.
- It takes no more than 4 seconds for a person to make eye contact with a stranger.
- Turkey has the largest number of green-eyed people. According to statistics, there are about 20% of them.
- The iris of the human eye is as unique as our fingerprints. The irises of 7 billion people are different, the probability of finding the same ones is zero.
- In Russia, most people have gray and blue eyes. A third of the population has brown eyes. In Belarus and Ukraine, half of the inhabitants have a dark eye shade. In Latin American countries, the number of brown-eyed residents has long exceeded 80%.
- It is believed that dark-eyed men and women make friends faster than gray-eyed and blue-eyed ones.
- In light-eyed people, the iris constantly changes its shade. The color depends on your well-being and mood. In newly awakened newborn children, the pupil becomes cloudy, in upset or offended children it turns slightly green, in cheerful ones it acquires a bluish tint. If the baby is hungry, the eyes become dark.
- A disease in which the pupils have different colors is called heterochromia.
- Eye color can change when exposed to low temperatures and blinding artificial lighting.
- Those with dark eyes now have the opportunity to change the shade of their iris. Color change surgery involves removing the top layer of the iris.
