News Animals

Microbe lets mite dads perform virgin birth

By Susan Milius

- More than 2 years ago

For the first time, biologists have found an animal, a gender-bent mite, living and procreating quite well despite the supposed handicap of carrying genes from just one parent.

Among these offspring of tropical mites treated with antibiotics, some escaped a gender-bending bacterium and grew into males (arrows). Typically, the infection feminizes a mite, enabling it to lay eggs (below, mite shown with one egg).