The Great Snook
Fri, 8th Feb '08, 7:37pm
Christians in a panic worldwide (http://http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=512879&in_page_id=1811)
Imprisoned in a tank hundreds of miles from a mate, Ibolya the female shark resorted to desperate measures. To the astonishment of her keepers, she spontaneously produced a perfectly healthy pup.
The virgin birth is making biologists think again about one of the oldest and - in evolutionary terms - most successful creatures.
"When I saw the baby shark lying on the bottom of the tank I thought it was a joke," said Attilia Varga, the director of the Nyiregyahaza Centre in Hungary. "I was amazed when I realised it was a real shark."
Ibolya, a white-tipped reef shark, has been with the aquarium for seven years. In that time, she has never shared water with a male.
The pup has been a hit with visitors - but has left keepers looking for a bigger tank. They also plan to find a male so Ibolya can breed conventionally next time.
Virgin birth - parthenogenesis - happens when an egg begins to divide without being fertilised. Common in insects, it is rare in vertebrates such as fish, birds and reptiles.
Scientists believe that sharks use it as an emergency survival mechanism. Normally animals rely on genetic diversity - the interplay of genes from two parents - to evolve. However, reproduction without sex is a useful stopgap.
Sharks are one of Nature's great survivors, appearing in the oceans 400million years ago - before the dinosaurs. Normally their eggs are fertilised inside the female.
In the white tip and most other species, the female gives birth to live young.
Imprisoned in a tank hundreds of miles from a mate, Ibolya the female shark resorted to desperate measures. To the astonishment of her keepers, she spontaneously produced a perfectly healthy pup.
The virgin birth is making biologists think again about one of the oldest and - in evolutionary terms - most successful creatures.
"When I saw the baby shark lying on the bottom of the tank I thought it was a joke," said Attilia Varga, the director of the Nyiregyahaza Centre in Hungary. "I was amazed when I realised it was a real shark."
Ibolya, a white-tipped reef shark, has been with the aquarium for seven years. In that time, she has never shared water with a male.
The pup has been a hit with visitors - but has left keepers looking for a bigger tank. They also plan to find a male so Ibolya can breed conventionally next time.
Virgin birth - parthenogenesis - happens when an egg begins to divide without being fertilised. Common in insects, it is rare in vertebrates such as fish, birds and reptiles.
Scientists believe that sharks use it as an emergency survival mechanism. Normally animals rely on genetic diversity - the interplay of genes from two parents - to evolve. However, reproduction without sex is a useful stopgap.
Sharks are one of Nature's great survivors, appearing in the oceans 400million years ago - before the dinosaurs. Normally their eggs are fertilised inside the female.
In the white tip and most other species, the female gives birth to live young.