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NASA
NationalAeronautics andSpaceAdministration
Registered: 10/07/05
Posts: 11
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"Mating type" versus "sex"
#5671224 - 05/25/06 01:23 AM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pbio.0020183
Quote:
Some biologists call mating types sexes; others think that, in the absence of traits other than sexual compatibility or the lack thereof, it makes more sense to view species with many mating types as having no sexes, rather than lots.
I'm in the middle of a dispute on this matter. The problem is that we don't even seem to be able to agree upon the definition of each of these terms. Any input would be very much appreciated. Definitions, opinions, anything.
Thank you in advance, NASA
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RogerRabbit
Bans for Pleasure
Registered: 03/26/03
Posts: 42,214
Loc: Seattle
Last seen: 1 year, 1 month
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: NASA]
#5671861 - 05/25/06 08:19 AM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Perhaps compatible hyphae is more accurate. I think the word sex is mostly used as an analogy to make it easier for non-mycologists to understand fungi. RR
-------------------- Download Let's Grow Mushrooms semper in excretia sumus solim profundum variat "I've never had a failed experiment. I've only discovered 10,000 methods which do not work." Thomas Edison
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mycogirl
goddamn
Registered: 07/03/05
Posts: 1,135
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: RogerRabbit]
#5673134 - 05/25/06 01:46 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Question - Don't hyphae that would be compaible germinate from + or - spores that determint mating type? For example, myc. from a + spore can only exchange genetic information with myc. from a - spore.
Sorry if this is off, just trying to put it together in my head.
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EonTan
bird
Registered: 08/18/04
Posts: 468
Loc: very south
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: NASA]
#5696146 - 05/31/06 07:05 PM (17 years, 9 months ago) |
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MAting type factors lead to the compatability or incompatability of monokaryotic hyphae( single spores of Psilocybe cubensis germinate to form monokaryotic, or single haploid nuclei, hyphae). Each monokaryotic hyphae differes from the rest of the monokaryotic hyphae, but share certain A and/or B factors with 3/4 of the remaining monokaryotic hyphae germinated from a single spore print. Each monokaryon can only succesfully mate with a monokaryon that has DIFFERENT mating type A and B factors. So it can only mate with 1/4 of the remaing monokaryon hyphae. They mate to form Dikaryon hyphae, that contain TWO DIFFERENT nuclei each with half the genes neccessary to form fertile colony of mycelium.
It isn't sex. Sex results in two haploid nuclei fusing to form a single diploid nuclei. Plasmogamy forms a single cell with two distinct haploid nuceli living side by side in it. Karyogamy fuses the two distinct nuclei into a single diploid nuceli, but only temporarily before undergoing Meiosis.
Karyogamy is the closest thing to sex in Psilocybe cubensis. Funny that the analogy is most often applied to Plasmogamy, which doesn't look anything like sex.
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fastfred
Old Hand
Registered: 05/17/04
Posts: 6,899
Loc: Dark side of the moon
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: EonTan]
#5701081 - 06/01/06 07:43 PM (17 years, 9 months ago) |
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Actually, nuclear fusion does occur prior to meiosis. You seem to be treating "sex" as a verb rather than a noun. The question was about "sexes" or "sex" as a noun, not a verb. If you want to treat it as a verb the analogy still applies. Simply because the nuclei don't fuse immediately doesn't matter. Genetic material is exchanged and the nuclei fuse during fruiting, prior to meiosis.
As to the initial question... mating type = sex, sex = mating type. It's as simple as that. I don't think there is any dispute over that. Some biologists may prefer to use "mating type" rather than sex simply to imply that the species doesn't have a simple male/female sexual compatibility system. Or they're too bound up with the idea of sexual differences extending beyond mating compatibility. But even those people would have to admit that defining sex based on anything besides mating compatibility is foolish. They certainly wouldn't try to call a beefy woman a man or a wimpy man a woman, or try to tell them that they don't have sexes only mating types. So why try to say that just because a species doesn't have sexes that can clearly be differentiated by phenotype that it has no sexes?
-FF
-------------------- It drinks the alcohol and abstains from the weed or else it gets the hose again. -Chemy The difference between the substances doesn't matter. This is a war on consciousness, on our right to the very essence of what we are. With no control over that, we have no need to speak of freedom or a free society. -fireseed "If we are going to have a war on marijuana, the least we can do is pull the sick and the dying off the battlefield." -Neal Levine (MPP) I find the whole "my drug should be legal but yours should be illegal" mindset disgusting and hypocritical. It's what George Bush and company do when they drink a cocktail and debate the best way to imprison marijuana users. -Diploid
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EonTan
bird
Registered: 08/18/04
Posts: 468
Loc: very south
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: fastfred]
#5707072 - 06/03/06 10:54 AM (17 years, 9 months ago) |
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If you read my post I said nuclei fuse before meiosis. Why do you think I didn't?
Explain to me The tetrpolar heterothallic compatability system of Psilocybe cubensis using SEX or SEXES instead of mating types.
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fastfred
Old Hand
Registered: 05/17/04
Posts: 6,899
Loc: Dark side of the moon
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: EonTan]
#5707511 - 06/03/06 01:37 PM (17 years, 9 months ago) |
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I must have skipped that sentence.
I think you're letting your inability to accept more than two sexes create an artificial distinction. The "Sexes" male and female are simply the terms we use to identify the two mating types in our species, so why should this not apply to other species?
In seahorses the male bears the offspring, yet I've never heard any attempt to say that they don't have sexes or only posses "mating types". Other species possess both sexual and asexual reproduction and they are still defined as having "sexes". I'm unsure what your exact argument is that "mating type" isn't interchangeable with, or equivalent to, "sex".
-FF
-------------------- It drinks the alcohol and abstains from the weed or else it gets the hose again. -Chemy The difference between the substances doesn't matter. This is a war on consciousness, on our right to the very essence of what we are. With no control over that, we have no need to speak of freedom or a free society. -fireseed "If we are going to have a war on marijuana, the least we can do is pull the sick and the dying off the battlefield." -Neal Levine (MPP) I find the whole "my drug should be legal but yours should be illegal" mindset disgusting and hypocritical. It's what George Bush and company do when they drink a cocktail and debate the best way to imprison marijuana users. -Diploid
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EonTan
bird
Registered: 08/18/04
Posts: 468
Loc: very south
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Re: "Mating type" versus "sex" [Re: fastfred]
#5714877 - 06/05/06 12:44 PM (17 years, 9 months ago) |
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We can agree to disagree.
I just like things to make sense. To me Fungi have no sexes.
I mean a single sex from one strain can mate with all sexes of another strain. In what world does SEXES make sense under those circumstances, beyond analogies.
I would agree to say that the two are analogous, but I definetly would not say they are interchangable, or the same.
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