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A gamete (/ ˈ ɡ æ m iː t /; from Ancient Greek γαμετή (gametḗ) 'wife', ultimately from Ancient Greek γάμος (gámos) 'marriage') is a haploid cell that fuses with another haploid cell during fertilization in organisms that reproduce sexually. [1] Gametes are an organism's reproductive cells, also referred to as sex cells. [2]
It is the biological process of gametogenesis during which cells that are haploid or diploid divide to create other cells. It can take place either through mitotic or meiotic division of diploid gametocytes into different cells depending on an organism's biological life cycle. For instance, gametophytes in plants undergo mitosis to produce gametes.
Animals have life cycles with a single diploid multicellular phase that produces haploid gametes directly by meiosis. Male gametes are called sperm, and female gametes are called eggs or ova. In animals, fertilization of the ovum by a sperm results in the formation of a diploid zygote that develops by repeated mitotic divisions into a diploid ...
The diploid zygote undergoes repeated cellular division by mitosis to grow into the organism. In the haplontic life cycle (with post-zygotic meiosis), the organism is haploid, by the proliferation and differentiation of a single haploid cell called the gamete. Two organisms of opposing sex contribute their haploid gametes to form a diploid zygote.
Two single-celled haploid gametes, each containing n unpaired chromosomes, fuse to form a single-celled diploid zygote, which now contains n pairs of chromosomes, i.e. 2n chromosomes in total. [ 17 ] The single-celled diploid zygote germinates, dividing by the normal process ( mitosis ), which maintains the number of chromosomes at 2 n .
Through meiosis, the diploid meiocyte divides into four genetically different haploid gametes. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] The control of the meiocyte through the meiotic cell cycle varies between different groups of organisms.
diplontic life cycle — the diploid stage is multicellular and haploid gametes are formed, meiosis is "gametic". haplodiplontic life cycle (also referred to as diplohaplontic, diplobiontic, or dibiontic life cycle) — multicellular diploid and haploid stages occur, meiosis is "sporic". The cycles differ in when mitosis (growth) occurs.
It is the stage of the life cycle when a cell gives rise to haploid cells each having half as many chromosomes as the parental cell. Two such haploid gametes, ordinarily arising from different individual organisms, fuse by the process of fertilization, thus completing the sexual cycle. Meiosis is ubiquitous among eukaryotes.