How Seymour Benzer denoted the term cistron? What cistron stand for? Does cistron related to cis-trans experiment?
The term "cistron" stands for a sequence, which encodes a particular polypeptide. And yes, it's related to cis-trans experiment. In eukaryotes the term is close to "locus" or, in more common sense, to "gene". If two recessive mutations at different homologous chromosomes in trans-heterozygous (heteroallelic) combination make the same recessive phenotype, they considered to belong to the same cistron. The term nowadays is mostly used in prokaryota genetics to emphasize organization of single genes into an operon.
Roman is correct, cistron derives from the results of a cis-tran test to designate the location (locus) of cis-acting mutations with the same phenotype. This designation stems from the time before there was a solid molecular understanding of what a gene was.
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