Allele
Heterozygous
Homozygous
Zygote
Heterozygote
Homozygote
Dominant
Recessive
Incomplete Dominant
Co-dominant
Phenotype
Genotype
Do yourself a favor, use them (correctly!). Ignore words like "super", except for branding and marketing purposes.
You can also ignore the word "gene", no one here ever uses it correctly.
Luckily, talk about chromosomes can be ignored as well except when we are discussing parthenogenesis, because snake sex chromosomes work differently than what you know about humans. At least that is one less thing I consider "need to know" for anyone breeding for specific traits in animals.
K-12 should be the very MINIMUM of the formal education you received, assuming you are not a minor, and I fully expect you to be able to handle the one chapter out of a subject typically taught to fourteen-year-olds that is relevant to your hobby.
If you're feeling like you don't have a firm grasp of the above, please DON'T hesitate to ask! No one laughs at the person trying to learn, heck nothing makes me happier. A GREAT starting point is wikipedia. Spending 10 minutes a day reading and clicking links, starting at the page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introduction_to_genetics is a great way to get more out of a hobby that involves (and tends to revolve around) genetic inheritance!
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As for the possibility of homozygote pinstripes: Cool! Good luck proving them out.
I keep an open mind about just how well defined these traits are. Sometimes there are pretty subtle changes in the phenotypes when certain alleles are present. It's well known that piebald heterozygotes have markers that are sometimes distinguishable visually from "normals", and piebald hets can be pretty wonky when combined with other common traits. That's enough to make the piebald trait not fit our concrete definition of "recessive", but then again the ability to pick out normals from hets isn't something that can be done with 100% accuracy.
It very well may be possible that homozygote pinstripes exhibit certain differences from heterozygotes that just aren't easy to spot. Heck it may be even more subtle than that, and homozygote pinstripes may just have a higher TENDENCY towards a particular pattern. I'll support any efforts to further our knowledge of how we can manipulate the pattern and coloration of these fun animal. I especially support efforts that have been given up by seemingly everyone else. Projects that are determined to be likely less profitable are often ignored.
Good luck. I'd like to see what happens when we have baby-to-adult pictures of a dozen or two "likely proven" homozygote pinstripes.
It's all about data, data, data... gotta get enough of it to perform ANY kind of analysis. Science is all about repeatable results!
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