My Molly is a clone.

[gwand]

The Amazon molly — a sex-skipping fish — hacks evolution

The Amazon molly reproduces without sex. A genomic copy-and-paste trick called gene conversion may explain how it avoids evolutionary meltdown.

www.sciencenews.org

 

[MuddyWaters]

This is interesting - not sure I totally get it, but wow! The fish still needs a male partner, right? The babies just end up as clones of the mother?

 

[Rusty_Shackleford]

I wonder how this is different than parthenogenisis in reptiles. Though in parthenogenisis both male and female offspring are possible as well a direct clones of the female depending on the species.

 

[gwand]

I wonder how this is different than parthenogenisis in reptiles. Though in parthenogenisis both male and female offspring are possible as well a direct clones of the female depending on the species.

In parthenogenesis the offspring gets all of its DNA from the mother, but it is not always an exact genetic copy. Because egg cells are produced through Meiosis, genetic recombination can occur, so the offspring may differ genetically from the mother. A cloned animal has an exact genetic copy of the parent cell. The parent cell doesn’t go through meiosis. So there is no chance for chromosomes recombination.