Question

What are some possible costs of sexual reproduction? (choose all that apply)

	a.	Loss of reproductive ‘market share’ (relative to asexual reproduction):  Offspring only have half your DNA instead of 100%.
	b.	Increased risk of cancer in sexually reproducing animals
	c.	Challenges and dangers of finding a mate
	d.	Increased risk of reproductive senescence
	e.	Slower reproduction relative to asexual organisms

Answer 1

Some possible costs of sexual reproduction are:

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A. Loss of reproductive ‘market share’ (relative to asexual reproduction):  Offspring only have half your DNA instead of 100%. C. Challenges and dangers of finding a mate. D. Increased risk of reproductive senescence. E. Slower reproduction relative to asexual organisms. Explanation: A. Sexual reproduction involves the mixing of genetic information between two individuals with each parent disrupting a successful genome and only passing half onto each offspring. C. Finding a mate can be costly in time and energy and may also increase risk of predation and parasite transmission. D. Mating in sexual reproduction may harm the female and affect her future reproductive success. E. Asexual reproduction can be proved as a very successful reproductive strategy which produces a large number of offspring much more rapidly than through the sexual reproduction. Asexual reproduction occurs by many methods such as bidding, vegetative cloning, parthenogenesis and different gene transfer methods. Thus, sexual reproduction has slower reproduction relative to asexual organisms.