A Short-Term Advantage for Syngamy in the Origin of Eukaryotic Sex: Effects of Cell Fusion on Cell Cycle Duration and Other Effects Related to the Duration of the Cell Cycle—Relationship between Cell Growth Curve and the Optimal Size of the Species, and Circadian Cell Cycle in Photosynthetic Unicellular Organisms
Figure 9
Simulation of a population change from asexual to sexual, with CELLSIMULATOR. Top: complete history. Bottom: zoom to changing period. In , an asexual cell mutates to sexual; in , the entire population is sexual. A generation lasts about 12 time units, so substitution occurred in 115 generations. (A: asexual haploids; F: sexual haploids; AF: heterozygous asexual-sexual diploids; FF: homozygous sexual diploids). Population size increases due to the smaller cell size caused by the selective pressure of sexual strategy.
