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Mating in fungi is a complex process governed by mating types. Research on fungal mating has focused on several model species with different behaviour. [3] [4] Not all fungi reproduce sexually and many that do are isogamous; thus, for many members of the fungal kingdom, the terms "male" and "female" do not apply.
Most fungi can produce asexually and sexually. Currently, sexual selection has been studied to occur more predominantly in the Ascomycota and Basidiomycota phyla. Although different sexes are not present within fungi, sexual selection can act due to the presence of different sex roles as well as different mating types as most fungi are hermaphroditic. [1]
Even among fungi that reproduce both sexually and asexually, often only one method of reproduction can be observed at a specific point in time or under specific conditions. Additionally, fungi typically grow in mixed colonies and sporulate amongst each other. These facts have made it very difficult to link the various states of the same fungus.
Fungi are classified by the methods of sexual reproduction they employ. The outcome of sexual reproduction most often is the production of resting spores that are used to survive inclement times and to spread. There are typically three phases in the sexual reproduction of fungi: plasmogamy, karyogamy and meiosis. The cytoplasm of two parent ...
Fungi employ two mating systems: heterothallic species allow mating only between individuals of the opposite mating type, whereas homothallic species can mate, and sexually reproduce, with any other individual or itself. [94] Most fungi have both a haploid and a diploid stage in their life cycles.
The name Zygomycota refers to the zygosporangia characteristically formed by the members of this clade, in which resistant spherical spores are formed during sexual reproduction. Zygos is Greek for "joining" or "a yoke", referring to the fusion of two hyphal strands which produces these spores, and -mycota is a suffix referring to a division of ...
A few types of organisms, such as many fungi and the ciliate Paramecium aurelia, [11] have more than two "sexes", called mating types. Most animals (including humans) and plants reproduce sexually. Sexually reproducing organisms have different sets of genes for every trait (called alleles). Offspring inherit one allele for each trait from each ...
In some organisms, sexual reproduction has been shown to enhance the spread of parasitic genetic elements (e.g. yeast, filamentous fungi). [79] Bacterial conjugation is a form of genetic exchange that some sources describe as "sex", but technically is not a form of reproduction, even though it is a form of horizontal gene transfer.