Female Shark Reproduced Without Male DNA, Scientists Say


By HENRY FOUNTAIN
Published: May 23, 2007

A hammerhead shark that gave birth in a Nebraska aquarium reproduced without mating, a genetic analysis shows.

This shark’s mother is said to have had no contact with male sharks.

This form of asexual reproduction, called parthenogenesis, has been found in other vertebrate species, including some snakes and lizards. But this is the first time it has been documented in a shark.

Researchers from the Guy Harvey Research Institute at Nova Southeastern University in Florida and Queen’s University Belfast in Northern Ireland found no male DNA in the female baby shark, which was born in December 2001 and died shortly after birth, apparently killed by another fish. The mother was one of three female bonnetheads, a small hammerhead species, that had been captured in Florida and kept without male sharks for three years in the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha.

Female Shark Reproduced Without Male DNA, Scientists Say


By HENRY FOUNTAIN
Published: May 23, 2007

A hammerhead shark that gave birth in a Nebraska aquarium reproduced without mating, a genetic analysis shows.

This shark’s mother is said to have had no contact with male sharks.

This form of asexual reproduction, called parthenogenesis, has been found in other vertebrate species, including some snakes and lizards. But this is the first time it has been documented in a shark.

Researchers from the Guy Harvey Research Institute at Nova Southeastern University in Florida and Queen’s University Belfast in Northern Ireland found no male DNA in the female baby shark, which was born in December 2001 and died shortly after birth, apparently killed by another fish. The mother was one of three female bonnetheads, a small hammerhead species, that had been captured in Florida and kept without male sharks for three years in the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha.

I thought your title mentioned men. But I suppose if you are a shark (or snake or lizard) then it doesn't matter to you. Good luck.

Anyone who can't pull off parthenogenesis, apparently.

It was a joke. Parthenogenesis for women. Get it?

gay guys/animals need men.


peace.

A decade ago, however, doctors discovered the closest thing to a virgin human birth ever recorded. They were carrying out tests on a boy who had mild learning difficulties and asymmetric facial features, but was otherwise healthy.

The tests revealed his blood cells were female, suggesting the boy was a chimera, a mixture of two different cell types. This is usually the result of the fusion of two embryos that would otherwise have formed non-identical twins - a phenomenon that may be relatively common (and which poses a delightful conundrum for those who believe in souls).

The boy, though, turned out to be even more unusual. What really amazed geneticists was the discovery that both the X chromosomes in his blood cells derived from the boy's mother, rather than one coming from the father as usual.

What seems to have happened is that an egg began developing parthenogenetically, but was later fertilised, resulting in an embryo that was a mixture of normal and parthenogenetic cells.

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/shortsharpscience/

Phonetic.