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Re-inventing sex: A W chromosome and a path out of parthenogenesis for Bunonema nematodes

Fierst, J. L.; Arbex Herden, L.; Eggers, V. K.; Burns, C. A.; Sosa, J. A.; Kayastha, P.; McCauley, M. A.; Willicott, K.

2026-07-30 evolutionary biology
10.64898/2026.07.28.741199 bioRxiv
Show abstract

Sex chromosomes are deeply conserved in some organisms but remarkably labile in others. Here we describe a novel, female-hemizygous ZW sex chromosome system in the nematode Bunonema JU3390. We propose this neo-sex chromosome evolved from an autosome to escape mutational meltdown from lethal structural mutations accumulated during a period of parthenogenesis, demonstrating the role of evolutionary contingency in this rapid re-invention of sex.

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