Question

What selective advantage drove the development of sexual reproduction and how did it develop

Answer 1

Answer:

it’s all about DNA. Have you learned about DNA and how it copies itself each time a cell divides into more cells? DNA, the hereditary material in our bodies, is always best when it is DIVERSE. The more diverse the DNA of a population of people or animals is, the better that population is suited to survive many different environmental conditions. For example, populations with genetic diversity can adapt to new environmental conditions via natural selections and genetic mutations that make the animal or person better able to survive. Without lots of different DNA sequences, it is hard to adapt, because you aren’t working with much diversity in the first place!! Does that make sense?!

So sexual reproduction, unlike the straight cloning that happens in certain types of single cell organisms like bacteria, produces more diversity by taking genetic material from both a male and female and combining it in new ways. This genetic diversity is very good for the animal! In fact, scientists have actually found that although bacteria do not have sex, they exchange DNA through tubes that like one bacteria to the other sometimes, and thus diversify their gene pool! All this makes the organisms better able to adapt to new environments, and ensures that a quick environmental change will not wipe out the animal and make the population go extinct.

Explanation:

Answer 2

Answer:

The evolution of sexual reproduction is an adaptive feature which is common to almost all multi-cellular organisms (and also some single-cellular organisms) with many being incapable of reproducing asexually. Prior to the advent of sexual reproduction, the adaptation process whereby genes would change from one generation to the next (genetic mutation) happened very slowly and randomly. Sex evolved as an extremely efficient mechanism for producing variation, and this had the major advantage of enabling organisms to adapt to changing environments. Sex did, however, come with a cost. In reproducing asexually, no time nor energy needs to be expended in choosing a mate. And if the environment has not changed, then there may be little reason for variation, as the organism may already be well adapted. Sex, however, has evolved as the most prolific means of species branching into the tree of life. Diversification into the phylogenetic tree happens much more rapidly via sexual reproduction than it does by way of asexual reproduction.