Dioecious
Dioecy ( ; ; adj. dioecious, ) is a characteristic of certain species that have distinct unisexual individuals, each producing either male or female gametes, either directly (in animals) or indirectly (in seed plants). Dioecious reproduction is biparental reproduction. Dioecy has costs, since only the female part of the population directly produces offspring. It is one method for excluding self-fertilization and promoting allogamy (outcrossing), and thus tends to reduce the expression of recessive deleterious mutations present in a population. Plants have several other methods of preventing self-fertilization including, for example, dichogamy, herkogamy, and self-incompatibility. In zoology In zoology, dioecy means that an animal is either male or female, in which case the synonym gonochory is more often used. Most animal species are gonochoric, almost all vertebrate species are gonochoric, and all bird and mammal species are gonochoric. Dioecy may also describe colonies ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gonochory
In biology, gonochorism is a sexual system where there are two sexes and each individual organism is either male or female. The term gonochorism is usually applied in animal species, the vast majority of which are gonochoric. Gonochorism contrasts with simultaneous hermaphroditism but it may be hard to tell if a species is gonochoric or sequentially hermaphroditic e.g. parrotfish, '' Patella ferruginea''. However, in gonochoric species individuals remain either male or female throughout their lives. Species that reproduce by thelytokous parthenogenesis and do not have males can still be classified as gonochoric. Terminology The term is derived from Greek ''gone'' 'generation' + ''chorizein'' 'to separate'. The term gonochorism originally came from German ''Gonochorismus''. Gonochorism is also referred to as unisexualism or gonochory. Evolution Gonochorism has evolved independently multiple times. It is very evolutionarily stable in animals. Its stability and advanta ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gonochorism
In biology, gonochorism is a sexual system where there are two Sex, sexes and each individual organism is either male or female. The term gonochorism is usually applied in animal species, the vast majority of which are gonochoric. Gonochorism contrasts with simultaneous hermaphroditism but it may be hard to tell if a species is gonochoric or Sequential hermaphroditism, sequentially hermaphroditic e.g. parrotfish, ''Patella ferruginea''. However, in gonochoric species individuals remain either male or female throughout their lives. Species that reproduce by Thelytokous, thelytokous parthenogenesis and do not have males can still be classified as gonochoric. Terminology The term is derived from Greek language, Greek ''gone'' 'generation' + ''chorizein'' 'to separate'. The term gonochorism originally came from German ''Gonochorismus''. Gonochorism is also referred to as unisexualism or gonochory. Evolution Gonochorism has Convergent evolution, evolved independently multiple ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Alternation Of Generations
Alternation of generations (also known as metagenesis or heterogenesis) is the predominant type of life cycle in plants and algae. In plants both phases are multicellular: the haploid sexual phase – the gametophyte – alternates with a diploid asexual phase – the sporophyte. A mature sporophyte produces haploid spores by meiosis, a process which reduces the number of chromosomes to half, from two sets to one. The resulting haploid spores germinate and grow into multicellular haploid gametophytes. At maturity, a gametophyte produces gametes by mitosis, the normal process of cell division in eukaryotes, which maintains the original number of chromosomes. Two haploid gametes (originating from different organisms of the same species or from the same organism) fuse to produce a diploid zygote, which divides repeatedly by mitosis, developing into a multicellular diploid sporophyte. This cycle, from gametophyte to sporophyte (or equally from sporophyte to gametophyte), is the way ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Allogamy
Allogamy or cross-fertilization is the fertilization of an ovum from one individual with the spermatozoa of another. By contrast, autogamy is the term used for self-fertilization. In humans, the fertilization event is an instance of allogamy. Self-fertilization occurs in hermaphroditic organisms where the two gametes fused in fertilization come from the same individual. This is common in plants (see Sexual reproduction in plants) and certain protozoans. In plants, allogamy is used specifically to mean the use of pollen from one plant to fertilize the flower of another plant and usually synonymous with the term "cross-fertilization" or "cross-pollination" (outcrossing). The latter term can be used more specifically to mean pollen exchange between different plant strains or even different plant species (where the term ''cross-hybridization'' can be used) rather than simply between different individuals. Allogamy is achieved through the use of external pollinating factors. The proce ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Siphonophorae
Siphonophorae (from Ancient Greek σίφων (siphōn), meaning "tube" and -φόρος (-phóros), meaning "bearing") is an order within Hydrozoa, a class of marine organisms within the phylum Cnidaria. According to the World Register of Marine Species, the order contains 175 species described thus far. Siphonophores are highly polymorphic and complex organisms. Although they may appear to be individual organisms, each specimen is in fact a colonial organism composed of medusoid and polypoid zooids that are morphologically and functionally specialized. Zooids are multicellular units that develop from a single fertilized egg and combine to create functional colonies able to reproduce, digest, float, maintain body positioning, and use jet propulsion to move. Most colonies are long, thin, transparent floaters living in the pelagic zone. Like other hydrozoans, some siphonophores emit light to attract and attack prey. While many sea animals produce blue and green biolumines ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Physalia
The Portuguese war (''Physalia physalis''), also known as the man-of-war or bluebottle, is a marine hydrozoan found in the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean. It is the only species in the genus ''Physalia'', which in turn is the only genus in the family Physaliidae. The name ''man o’ war'' comes from the man-of-war, a sailing warship, and the animal's resemblance to the Portuguese version (the caravel) at full sail. The man o' war are part of the neuston, organisms that live on the surface of the water. A gas-filled bladder provides buoyancy that lets the animal stay afloat on the surface of the water while tentacles which can be up to165 ft (9 to 50 m) long hang below the surface, containing venomous cnidocytes that help capture prey. The cnidocytes can deliver a sting powerful enough to kill fish, and even, in some cases, humans. A sail on the bladder, which may be left or right-handed, propels it about the sea, often in groups. Although it superficially resembles a jelly ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Self-incompatibility
Self-incompatibility (SI) is a general name for several genetic mechanisms that prevent self-fertilization in sexually reproducing organisms, and thus encourage outcrossing and allogamy. It is contrasted with separation of sexes among individuals (dioecy), and their various modes of spatial ( herkogamy) and temporal (dichogamy) separation. SI is best-studied and particularly common in flowering plants, although it is present in other groups, including sea squirts and fungi. In plants with SI, when a pollen grain produced in a plant reaches a stigma of the same plant or another plant with a matching allele or genotype, the process of pollen germination, pollen-tube growth, ovule fertilization, or embryo development is inhibited, and consequently no seeds are produced. SI is one of the most important means of preventing inbreeding and promoting the generation of new genotypes in plants and it is considered one of the causes of the spread and success of angiosperms on Earth. Mechan ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Spore
In biology, a spore is a unit of sexual reproduction, sexual (in fungi) or asexual reproduction that may be adapted for biological dispersal, dispersal and for survival, often for extended periods of time, in unfavourable conditions. Spores form part of the Biological life cycle, life cycles of many plants, algae, fungus, fungi and protozoa. They were thought to have appeared as early as the mid-late Ordovician period as an adaptation of early land plants. Bacterial spores are not part of a sexual cycle, but are resistant structures used for survival under unfavourable conditions. Myxozoan spores release amoeboid infectious germs ("amoebulae") into their hosts for parasitic infection, but also reproduce within the hosts through the pairing of two nuclei within the plasmodium, which develops from the amoebula. In plants, spores are usually haploid and unicellular and are produced by meiosis in the sporangium of a diploid sporophyte. In some rare cases, a diploid spore is also p ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sporophyte
A sporophyte () is one of the two alternation of generations, alternating multicellular organism, multicellular phases in the biological life cycle, life cycles of plants and algae. It is a diploid multicellular organism which produces asexual Spore, spores. This stage Alternation of generations, alternates with a multicellular haploid gametophyte phase. Life cycle The sporophyte develops from the zygote produced when a haploid egg cell is fertilized by a haploid sperm and each sporophyte cell therefore has a double set of chromosomes, one set from each parent. All Embryophyta, land plants, and most multicellular algae, have life cycles in which a multicellular diploid sporophyte phase alternates with a multicellular haploid gametophyte phase. In the Spermatophyte, seed plants, the largest groups of which are the gymnosperms (bare seeds) and angiosperms (fruiting plants), the sporophyte phase is more prominent than the gametophyte, and is the familiar green plant with its roots, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Germination
Germination is the process by which an organism grows from a seed or spore. The term is applied to the sprouting of a seedling from a seed of an angiosperm or gymnosperm, the growth of a sporeling from a spore, such as the spores of fungi, ferns, bacteria, and the growth of the pollen tube from the pollen grain of a seed plant. Seed plants Germination is usually the growth of a plant contained within a seed resulting in the formation of the seedling. It is also the process of reactivation of metabolic machinery of the seed resulting in the emergence of radicle and plumule. The seed of a vascular plant is a small package produced in a fruit or cone after the union of male and female reproductive cells. All fully developed seeds contain an embryo and, in most plant species some store of food reserves, wrapped in a seed coat. Dormant seeds are viable seeds that do not germinate because they require specific internal or environmental stimuli to resume growth. Und ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Zygote
A zygote (; , ) is a eukaryote, eukaryotic cell (biology), cell formed by a fertilization event between two gametes. The zygote's genome is a combination of the DNA in each gamete, and contains all of the genetic information of a new individual organism. The sexual fusion of haploid cells is called karyogamy, the result of which is the formation of a Ploidy#Haploid and monoploid, diploid cell called the zygote or zygospore. History German zoologists Oscar Hertwig, Oscar and Richard Hertwig made some of the first discoveries on animal zygote formation in the late 19th century. In multicellular organisms The zygote is the earliest developmental stage. In humans and most other Anisogamy, anisogamous organisms, a zygote is formed when an egg cell and sperm, sperm cell come together to create a new unique organism. The formation of a cell potency, totipotent zygote with the potential to produce a whole organism depends on epigenetics, epigenetic reprogramming. DNA demethyla ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Biological Life Cycle
In biology, a biological life cycle (or just life cycle when the biological context is clear) is a series of stages of the life of an organism, that begins as a zygote, often in an egg, and concludes as an adult that reproduces, producing an offspring in the form of a new zygote which then itself goes through the same series of stages, the process repeating in a cyclic fashion. "The concept is closely related to those of the life history, Developmental biology, development and ontogeny, but differs from them in stressing renewal." Transitions of form may involve growth, asexual reproduction, or sexual reproduction. In some organisms, different "generations" of the species succeed each other during the life cycle. For Embryophyte, plants and many algae, there are two multicellular stages, and the life cycle is referred to as alternation of generations. The term life history is often used, particularly for organisms such as the red algae which have three multicellular stages (or mor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |