Video Transcript
The leafy sea dragon is a type of
fish that lives off the coast of Australia. When a male sea dragon and a female
sea dragon meet, the female deposits her eggs underneath the tail of the male, where
he can fertilize them. What type of reproduction is this
an example of?
In order to answer correctly, let’s
review the two types of reproduction: sexual and asexual reproduction. A major difference between sexual
and asexual reproduction is the number of parents involved. In sexual reproduction, for
example, in humans, two parents form gametes, or sex cells, that are haploid in
their genetic information. This means that they contain half
of the genetic information that would be found in most other body cells, which is
often represented as n. A gamete from a male and female of
the same species can come together, and the genetic material of both gametes can
fuse in a process called fertilization. The resulting cell or zygote
contains the full amount of genetic information, which is often represented as
2n. And this will develop into a
complete organism with traits from both the biological mother and biological
father.
Asexual reproduction, on the other
hand, only involves one parent. This is a process that is usually
seen in unicellular organisms, such as bacteria and yeast. One example of asexual reproduction
happens through a process called binary fission, in which the parent cell divides
into two genetically identical daughter cells. Note that the daughter cells are
genetically identical to each other and to their parent because no recombination of
genetic material occurred.
With this knowledge, let’s return
to our question about the leafy sea dragon. Note that both male and female
leafy sea dragons are involved in reproduction, so two parents are needed to
reproduce. The correct answer to our question
is, therefore, sexual reproduction.
