BIOL 150 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Bacterial Conjugation, Mitosis, Meiosis
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Learning objectives: compare and contrast meiosis and mitosis, describe the differences between eukaryotic and prokaryotic chromosomes, understand the genetic advantages of sexual reproduction (i. e. why was sex invented? , explain the types of re-combination that can spread (propagate) biodiversity. 5a) explain how populations of the same species might have slightly different traits. 5b) explain how the dna of organisms of the same species may differ. Prokaryotes reproduce asexually through binary fission (cell division) and as such can result in genetic clones. Bacterial conjugation (or: sex in bacteria ): prokaryotes can scramble genetic information by using this process (dna exchange through pili). Horizontal gene transfer refers to exchange of genetic information laterally (species to species in real time ) rather than longitudinally from generation to generation. The origin of sex (about 1. 2 billion years ago ) It seems that a sexual cycle is maintained because it improves the quality of progeny (fitness), despite reducing the overall number of offspring.
