Reproduction

Only systems containing elements or subsystems capable or propagation, reproduction can undergo natural selection and thereforebiological evolution. The reproduction mechanism can differ. Growth followed, after a certain period of time or after achieving a certain size, by division into two or more daughter individuals probably seems most natural to us. However, it should be emphasized that this is a highly “biocentric” point of view and, in actual fact, reproduction can occur through a quite different mechanism. Some transposons or viruses are actually copied and inserted to a new site on the genome, while others only rewrite a certain section of the DNA according to their own sequence in a process of gene conversion.  Thus physical reproduction does not actually occur at all; what is reproduced is the number of copies of certain information.

Was this information useful for you?
The classical Darwinian theory of evolution can explain the evolution of adaptive traits only in asexual organisms. The frozen plasticity theory is much more general: It can also explain the origin and evolution of adaptive traits in both asexual and sexual organisms Read more