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Evolution of sexual reproduction: a view from the Fungal Kingdom supports an evolutionary epoch with sex before sexes.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Heitman, J
Published in: Fungal Biol Rev
December 1, 2015

Sexual reproduction is conserved throughout each supergroup within the eukaryotic tree of life, and therefore thought to have evolved once and to have been present in the last eukaryotic common ancestor (LECA). Given the antiquity of sex, there are features of sexual reproduction that are ancient and ancestral, and thus shared in diverse extant organisms. On the other hand, the vast evolutionary distance that separates any given extant species from the LECA necessarily implies that other features of sex will be derived. While most types of sex we are familiar with involve two opposite sexes or mating types, recent studies in the fungal kingdom have revealed novel and unusual patterns of sexual reproduction, including unisexual reproduction. In this mode of reproduction a single mating type can on its own undergo self-fertile/homothallic reproduction, either with itself or with other members of the population of the same mating type. Unisexual reproduction has arisen independently as a derived feature in several different lineages. That a myriad of different types of sex determination and sex determinants abound in animals, plants, protists, and fungi suggests that sex specification itself may not be ancestral and instead may be a derived trait. If so, then the original form of sexual reproduction may have been unisexual, onto which sexes were superimposed as a later feature. In this model, unisexual reproduction is both an ancestral and a derived trait. In this review, we consider what is new and what is old about sexual reproduction from the unique vantage point of the fungal kingdom.

Duke Scholars

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Published In

Fungal Biol Rev

DOI

ISSN

1749-4613

Publication Date

December 1, 2015

Volume

29

Issue

3-4

Start / End Page

108 / 117

Location

Netherlands

Related Subject Headings

  • Microbiology
  • 3107 Microbiology
  • 3104 Evolutionary biology
  • 0605 Microbiology
  • 0603 Evolutionary Biology
  • 0602 Ecology
 

Citation

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Heitman, J. (2015). Evolution of sexual reproduction: a view from the Fungal Kingdom supports an evolutionary epoch with sex before sexes. Fungal Biol Rev, 29(3–4), 108–117. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fbr.2015.08.002
Heitman, Joseph. “Evolution of sexual reproduction: a view from the Fungal Kingdom supports an evolutionary epoch with sex before sexes.Fungal Biol Rev 29, no. 3–4 (December 1, 2015): 108–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fbr.2015.08.002.
Heitman, Joseph. “Evolution of sexual reproduction: a view from the Fungal Kingdom supports an evolutionary epoch with sex before sexes.Fungal Biol Rev, vol. 29, no. 3–4, Dec. 2015, pp. 108–17. Pubmed, doi:10.1016/j.fbr.2015.08.002.
Journal cover image

Published In

Fungal Biol Rev

DOI

ISSN

1749-4613

Publication Date

December 1, 2015

Volume

29

Issue

3-4

Start / End Page

108 / 117

Location

Netherlands

Related Subject Headings

  • Microbiology
  • 3107 Microbiology
  • 3104 Evolutionary biology
  • 0605 Microbiology
  • 0603 Evolutionary Biology
  • 0602 Ecology