The Origin of Sex

Sexual reproduction is considered one of the main drivers of biological diversity, but explaining its origin is one of the most puzzling problems in evolutionary biology. The paradox of sex lies in the seemingly dead-end strategy of halving your genetic heritage by sharing the genome of your off-spring with another organism. In this project we will specifically test the hypothesis that sexual reproduction was in its initiation linked to formation of a survival stage, and that its main adaptive benefits were to ensure survival in the harsh and changeable environment of the young earth and to purge populations of the resulting mutational loads. This type of life cycle is still found in many unicellular organisms (protists). We will test our hypothesis by a combination of bioinformatics (mining data-archives for genes central to sexual reproduction and resting stage formation) and experimental induction of sexual reproduction in selected protist species.