Stick insects retain gene-balancing after a million years without sex
Researchers at Bangor University discovered that asexual stick insects have maintained a male-female gene-balancing mechanism despite not reproducing sexually for a million years. This finding challenges previous scientific assumptions that such mechanisms would erode over time in the absence of sexual reproduction.
Why it matters
This study provides new insights into evolutionary biology and the persistence of genetic mechanisms in species that bypass traditional sexual reproduction.
Image source, Bart Zijlstra Photography Image caption, Experts say Timema have reproduced without needing sex for about a million years
Asexual stick insects that have reproduced without male fertilisation for a million years have managed to retain a male-female gene-balancing mechanism, a study has found.
Experts at Bangor University, Gwynedd, looked at the genes of species of Timema, wingless stick insects in the US that reproduce when an embryo develops from an unfertilised egg, known as a virgin birth.
Scientists expected the system that has evolved for balancing gene expression on sex chromosomes would have eroded, saying the species was thought to have gone through the longest period of asexual reproduction of any insect.
But their study of rare males found this was not the case.
Genes are small sections of DNA found on chromosomes.
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