Video Transcript
Which member of the honeybee
community is formed as a result of parthenogenesis? (A) A male worker, (B) a female
worker, (C) a male drone, (D) a female drone, or (E) the queen.
Reproduction is the process by
which organisms produce offspring. And it can be done either sexually
or asexually. Sexual reproduction usually occurs
when haploid gametes from two parents fuse together to form a diploid zygote, which
then develops into an embryo.
Remember that while diploid cells
have a full set of genetic material, composed of two sets of chromosomes, haploid
cells contain half this amount, only a single set of chromosomes. The offspring that are produced
through sexual reproduction tend to have a high genetic variation, as they usually
receive genetic material from two different individuals. This helps populations to be more
resilient to environmental changes, like the introduction of a new disease.
Asexual reproduction is when one
parent produces offspring that are genetically identical. And while it is much faster than
sexual reproduction, the genetic variation in the offspring produced is much
lower.
Parthenogenesis is a form of
asexual reproduction, and it is the method of interest to us in this question. Parthenogenesis is when an embryo
forms and develops from an unfertilized egg cell. We can tell that this is an example
of asexual reproduction as it does not involve the fusion of gametes in
fertilization.
Honeybee communities usually
consist of three types of individuals: one female queen, female workers, and male
drones. Interestingly, the honeybee uses
different types of reproduction to help determine the biological sex of their
offspring. Male honeybee drones result from
asexual parthenogenesis. And they are all produced from the
queen. As a result of receiving half of
the queen’s genetic material, these male drones are haploid. The main function of the drones is
to reproduce with the honeybee queen.
Female offspring on the other hand,
like workers and new queens, are made through sexual reproduction when the queen
mates with the male drones. As this process involves the fusion
of two haploid gametes, the females that are produced are diploid.
As we know that parthenogenesis in
honeybees does not produce female offspring, we can eliminate options (B), (D), and
(E). We also know that female honeybees
are workers, not the males. So we can also eliminate option
(A).
This leaves us with option (C),
which correctly describes the member of the honeybee community that is formed as a
result of parthenogenesis. The correct answer to this question
is therefore (C), a male drone.
