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Female Shark Learns To Reproduce Without Males After Years Alone (newscientist.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from New Scientist: A female shark separated from her long-term mate has developed the ability to have babies on her own. Leonie the zebra shark (Stegostoma fasciatum) met her male partner at an aquarium in Townsville, Australia, in 1999. They had more than two dozen offspring together before he was moved to another tank in 2012. From then on, Leonie did not have any male contact. But in early 2016, she had three baby sharks. Intrigued, Christine Dudgeon at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, and her colleagues began fishing for answers. One possibility was that Leonie had been storing sperm from her ex and using it to fertilize her eggs. But genetic testing showed that the babies only carried DNA from their mum, indicating they had been conceived via asexual reproduction. Some vertebrate species have the ability to reproduce asexually even though they normally reproduce sexually. These include certain sharks, turkeys, Komodo dragons, snakes and rays. However, most reports have been in females who have never had male partners. In sharks, asexual reproduction can occur when a female's egg is fertilized by an adjacent cell known as a polar body, Dudgeon says. This also contains the female's genetic material, leading to "extreme inbreeding", she says. "It's not a strategy for surviving many generations because it reduces genetic diversity and adaptability." Nevertheless, it may be necessary at times when males are scarce. "It might be a holding-on mechanism," Dudgeon says. "Mum's genes get passed down from female to female until there are males available to mate with." It's possible that the switch from sexual to asexual reproduction is not that unusual; we just haven't known to look for it, Dudgeon says.
It's the Messiah! Bow down before them and adore them!
My first program:
Hell Segmentation fault
"Life... Finds a way."
WTF? This has been known for decades.
I'm sure if you look at the WIkipedia article it has said this for at least several years...
Talk about Fake News.
But has she figured out how to grow her own lasers yet?
Website Just Down For Me? Find out
I thought this was interesting. Thanks for posting it!
If men could reproduce after years of trying alone most slashdotters would be dads.
Well, in the spirit of South Park and Butters, soon women will only need us for our jokes. Sperm not required apparently.
Now, with lasers on their heads!
if we can only work out how to do this with just males, Slashdot may have a future ;)
She _learned_ it did she? Hopefully the same book that taught her about asexual reproduction doesn't have a chapter on lasers.
This place is filled with people with the world's most experienced experts on asexual reproduction.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
More ammo for the war on men....
Doomed I tell you! We are no longer needed at all what-so-ever
http://saveie6.com/
... if this has ever happened to a human, or near-human creature through human history.
I'm not even trying to make a joke. This genuinely intrigues me.
What biological mechanisms allow this? And what mechanisms trigger it?
Prior art in humans.
mommy brought a little Donald into the world.
Now there's a redneck sport if there ever was one. I bet there are ATVs involved and everything. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Looks like a feminist wet dream.
"Life... Finds a way."
Now I'm scared that my hand will end up getting pregnant one of these days..
So she was in an aquarium alone and separated from her "long-term mate". Sounds pretty evil to me. These places need to be closed down.
"Don't belong. Never join. Think for yourself. Peace." V.Stone, Microsoft Corporation
Did they name the baby sharks Jesus II, Jesus III and Jesus IV?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Because it is so dangerous for a man to get married and have children due to unfair family law. MGTOW. Look it up
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"Fishing", got it?
No?
Sharks are fishes, you know?
If needed I can be more explicit, just ask.
Nuffsaid
________
Don't know about his cat, but Schroedinger is definitely dead.
What better way to break free of the chains of male-dominated shark society than to render them unnecessary for breeding?
For human women. After parthenogenesis is perfected, Human males will become useless parasites, and can finally be eliminated, ending all of the problems on earth.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
i have been telling this to my wife, as she always got pregnant when she was travelling and i was not around. i think missing me caused her to learn how to becomes pregnant by herself.
"A shark female needs a shark male like a fish needs a bicycle" said the shark mother proudly to the media.
Because it is so dangerous for a man to get married and have children due to unfair family law. MGTOW. Look it up
While MGTOW is a little interesting, way too much of it is butthurt whining. But the point is taken that an increasing number of men who would make good mates for a woman have done a risk/benefit analysis, and decided that it is not worth it.
And that is kind of a problem. It's a passive avoidance, it isn't illegal. It's like avoiding smoking by not smoking. And as VR and "sex dolls" become more realistic, will only become worse.
What is worse, while stable prudent men decide to pursue their careers and keep their assets, and avoid relationships with females, the jerks and abusers won't change at all.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
So the baby is a clone of the mother?
My wife had the same thing happen to her as happened to that shark. I'd been working abroad 6 months and she managed to get pregnant completely on her own. Unbelievable.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Well, you may have som jerks and abusers that go for advanced sex dolls too. Abusing a sex doll till it "dies" (wears out from various damage) is cheaper than decades in prison.
The scientists will have to speak on her behalf, on Maury, Springer, and Wilco.
He's the father!
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
At the aquarium, a little kid was heard shouting "go fuck yourself" to the shark tank a few months ago.
#DeleteFacebook
i think the shark turns male on a full moon, spunks a load somewhere, tgen as the moon wanes the shark turns back into a female in short enough time the sperms swarm her like symbioticallt attached male gulper eels.
nm
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
After all, the majority of folks on this forum have spent years trying to achieve the same thing. Keep practicing guys, there's hope!
It's every woman's dream to be rid of the need for men!
Male /. readers learn to simulate reproduction without females after years alone.
The real question is how come, after 13 years, they decided to separate what was evidently a very successful pair of sharks? Seems that it would be wise to just keep them together.
It makes so much sense. I finally understand how feminists reproduce, and why they are so repugnant.
"How's your wife?" "Leaks a bit"
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
I don't really understand some of the science here. Can I get a car analogy?
Magical thinking and Lamarckism though appears again!
This stupid idea of mind over matter!
Things are willed into existence of a mind! (Natural things because of GOD MIND MAKES MATTER!)
Is a really deep rooted delusion, especially in religious folks.
While in reality minds are a product of biological evolution and matter organization.
Hence also the Lamarckism though about biological capabilities because a lifeforms willed itself to have or be so.