Question

Can you design a way to test the hypothesis that asexual reproduction leads to a higher evolutionary fitness (I.e. leads to more progeny) than sexual reproduction

Answer 1

Arguments:

While it is known that sexual reproduction is the foundation of evolutionary advancements, there is also an argument that asexual reproduction has better evolutionary fitness. This could be considered true in the sense that almost 50% of genetic information is what is passed on to the progeny from parents in sexual reproduction. This also accounts for a chance of losing 50% of important or beneficial trait/mutation with every mating and generations formed. However, in a stable population, asexual reproduction will lead to atleast one true offspring per parent with retained whole traits. This may build the argument to believe that asexual reproduction has twice the efficiency of sexual reproduction in making more like offsprings.

Another argument is with respect to the cost of maintenance of biological tools or the sex organs for longer periods of time for correct sexual interaction to happen. The act of sexual involvement and its leading to the female to carry the offspring (viviparous) is argued to be a biological burden. The argument also states that in sexual reproduction, there is in most cases the requirement for multiple interactions of multiple organisms, while in asexual interaction every individual organism has the potential to bring a new offspring, thus reducing the biological cost. This is called “2fold disadvantage of sex” where the cost of sex is measured as the cost of males.

Study:

A probable study to prove the hypothesis is localize female individuals of a group alone. Also, allow interaction of females of one group with that of another. In either cases, let no males be present in the study group. Isolate the two groups for few years, such that a normal interaction (otherwise) would have led to few generations. Also, make a third group in the study involving asexually reproducing group of organisms like bacteria etc. Check over generations. It will be seen that lack of males in the population has led to no generation of offspring.

Another test is the time study for generation of offsprings. It will be noticed that asexually producing organisms produce more number of offsprings in less time, as compared to any sexually reproducing organism.