On the adaptive value of Sex

  • Klaus Jaffe
Conference paper

Abstract

Using computer simulations I studied the conditions under which sex was evolutionary stable. The parameters that showed relevance to the stability of sex were: variable environments, mutation rates, ploidy, number of loci subject to evolution, mate selection strategy and reproductive systems. The simulations showed that mutants for sex and recombination are evolutionarily stable, displacing alleles for monosexuality in diploid populations mating assortatively when four conditions were fulfilled simultaneously: selection pressure was variable, mate selection was not random, ploydy was two or the reproductive strategy was haplo-dipoid or hermaphroditic, and the complexity of the genome was large (more than 4 loci suffered adaptation). The results suggest that at least three phenomena, related to sex, have convergent adaptive values: Diploidy, sexual reproduction (recombination) and the segregation of sexes. The results suggest that the emergence of sex had to be preceded by the emergence of diploid monosexual organisms and provide an explanation for the emergence and maintenance of sex among diploids and for the scarcity of sex among haploid organisms. The divergence of the evolutionary adaptation of the sexes is a derived consequence of the emergence of sex. A corollary of these simulations is that gene mixing, achieved by sex, is advantageous if the degree of mixing is not very great, suggesting that an optimal degree of gene mixing should exist for each species.

Keywords

Random Mating Reproductive Strategy Deleterious Mutation Asexual Reproduction Assortative Mating 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© NECSI Cambridge, Massachusetts 2008

Authors and Affiliations

  • Klaus Jaffe
    • 1
  1. 1.Departamento de Biología de OrganismosUniversidad Simón BolívarVenezuela

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