#mitosis

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As mentioned in my Photosynthesis post, Plants mostly reproduce asexually, however overall there are two ways an organism can reproduce (asexually and sexually) and also two ways a cell can divide (mitosis and meiosis) , although as seen in the title this post is going to explain Asexual reproduction and Mitosis.

Asexual reproduction involves Mitosis, an ordinary cell can make a new cell by simply dividing in two. Both new cells are genetically identical to the original cell - they both contain exactly the same genetic information, this cell division is known as Mitosis.

Some organisms produce offspring (children) using mitosis. This is known as asexual reproduction, Organisms which produce asexually include bacteria and some plants. (I will show some examples near the end).

Asexual reproduction involves only ONE parent. The offspring have identical genes to the parent - so there's no variation between parent and offspring, another word for asexual reproduction is cloning (I will do another post going more in depth about cloning).

Mitosis is when a cell reproduces itself by splitting to form two cells with identical sets of chromosomes.

Here's is how mitosis works:

In a cell that's not dividing, the DNA is all spread out in long strings, if the cell gets a signal to divide, it needs to duplicate its DNA - so there's one copy for each new cell. The DNA forms X-shaped chromosomes. Each 'arm' of the chromosome is and exact duplicate of the other.

The chromosomes then line up at the centre of the cell and cell fibres pull them apart. The two arms of each chromosome go to opposite ends of the cell.

Membranes form around each of the sets of chromosomes. These become the nuclei of the two new cells. (Nuclei is the plural version of nucleus)

Lastly, the cytoplasm divides. (The cytoplasm is the jelly-like substance inside a cell that holds organelles, supports cell shape, and allows chemical reactions to happen.)

You now have two new cells containing exactly the same DNA - they're genetically identical.

Mitosis also is how all plants and animals grow and repair damaged tissue.

Plants have several different ways of reproducing asexually, some plants do so by growing new plants from their stems.

An example of this is Strawberry Plants, The parent strawberry plant sends out runners - fast growing stems that grow out sideways, just above the ground.

The runners take root at various points (a short distance away) and new plants start to grow.

The new plants are clones of the parent strawberry plant, so there's no genetic variation between them.

This strawberry reproduction is an example of a natural method of asexual reproduction, but we can also clone them using artificial methods.

Gardeners can take cuttings from good parent plants, and then plant them to produce genetically identical copies (clones) of the parent plant.

Dude I'm asexual

so uhhh....