Pangenesis

Pangenesis is one of the early ideas people had about how babies get traits from their parents. The idea was that when parents had a baby, little pieces or 'parts' of their bodies called 'pangenes' were passed on to their kids. These pangenes were thought to be responsible for passing traits like eye color and hair color from one generation to the next. Scientists now know this is not true, but the idea of pangenesis still helps us think about how traits are passed on through parents to their children.