Artificial Intelligence is no match for Natural Stupidy

[PayDay]

So I caught this link on the main page news stories::

Why it caught my eye is because it's about asexual fungus sex.

Yeah:: Check it::
http://phys.org/news/2013-09-fungal-sex-drug-resistant-virulent.html

Heitman hypothesized that sex might be a means of creating genetic diversity. To test this hypothesis, he and his colleagues, former fellow Min Ni and current graduate student Marianna Feretzaki, grew the microbe in two different ways—one where it underwent asexual reproduction, the other where it underwent unisexual reproduction. They then took the offspring of those reproductive cycles and compared them to each other and to the starting parent.

The researchers found the offspring of*asexual reproduction*were essentially clones, looking just like each other and just like the parent. On the other hand, some of the offspring of unisexual reproduction differed, both in terms of genetic makeup and behavior. Those differences were due to a distinct genetic change called aneuploidy, or having more than the normal number of DNA-packaging chromosomes.

Aneuploidy is well known to be deleterious in humans, causing genetic disorders like Down's syndrome or trisomy 21. But having an extra chromosome can actually be beneficial in microbes like*Cryptococcus, where it has been shown to confer drug resistance to the antifungal fluconazole.

Neat huh?

Here's the part that I liked best from all the way down at the bottom of the article::

"An interesting feature of aneuploidy is it can be temporary," said Heitman. "If at some point it stops being beneficial or adaptive, the fungi can lose the chromosome just as easily as they gained it. In fact, we showed that if we took the aneuploid offspring and let them lose their extra chromosomes, they also lose their new properties and go back to behaving just like their parent did.

"The key finding, he said, "illustrates how unisexual reproduction introduces limited*genetic diversity*in clonal populations already well adapted to an environment, which may drive outbreaks of drug resistant pathogenic microbes.

"How's that for a slice of fried gold?"