Reproductive Biology of Fungi

Reproduction is the formation of new individuals with all the characteristics typical of the species. Most fungi reproduce asexually and sexually. Asexual reproduction is more important for propagation of the species as it is repeated several times during the life cycle and results in production of numerous exact copies of the parent. Sexual reproduction provides for meiotic recombination. Generally, it takes place only once in a life cycle. Some fungi do not go through a true sexual cycle, instead many of these practice parasexuality which provides a significant source of genetic variation. Nevertheless, sexual and parasexual cycles are not mutually exclusive. Fungi that exhibit sexuality may also accumulate additional and significant variation through parasexual reproduction.