Evolutionary Advantages to Sexual Reproduction

 Organisms can be classified by two reproductive types, asexual and sexual. Asexual reproduction produces genetically identical offspring to the single parent. However, sexual reproduction produces offspring from the combination of genes from two parents, resulting in each individual being genetically unique. There are numerous advantages to an organism sexually reproducing mainly stemming from increased genetic diversity within a species. Increasing genetic diversity allows a species to limit harmful mutations, select beneficial mutations, and reduce disease risk. There are three common terms associated with this concept. First, the red queen hypothesis states that organisms are constantly evolving and adapting to their environment to survive, resulting in no species gaining a constant advantage over another species. This is a benefit of sexual reproduction because the increased genetic diversity helps the species remain kept up with the adapting environment. Second, heterozygosity is the characteristic of an individual having two alleles for one gene or trait. This is a crucial step in the advantage of sexual selection because this increases the population's genetic variety to help the population continue adapting to new diseases and parasites. Finally, parasitism is a type of symbiotic relationship in which one organism benefits from the relationship and one organism is harmed. Occasionally, the parasite can use the host organism in a reproductive way, providing the parasite with numerous sexual reproduction advantages, including constant protection from predators and environmental threats, providing an efficient source of nutrients, and making their search for a mate much simpler. 

This information complements what I have learned in previous classes. During a future study, I would like to further explore if an organism can turn from an asexual to a sexually reproducing organism due to its evolutionary benefits.