TedTest

From the Ted Talk by Susan Freitas and Darren Parker: How does this all-female species reproduce?

Unscramble the Blue Letters

In 2021, wrorkes at a siniaardn aquarium were snenutd by the birth of a smoothhound shark, who they claled iespra. What shocked them was that, for the last decade, Ispera’s mother had been lviing only with other females. But it’s actually entirely possible that Ispera had no father— and the reason why that is also explains other bigiclaool curiosities, like the ecxintese of an all-female lizard species.

Usually sexual species have sex cells that contain half the number of chromosomes required to create a viable embryo. So an egg cell must be fertilized by a sperm cell to form two full sets of chromosomes. But some species that have sex cells can udngreo a type of asexual reproduction called parthenogenesis— meaning “virgin origin” in Greek. In parthenogenesis, an embryo develops from an unfertilized egg cell that doubles its own chromosome count. In fact, some animals only ever undergo parthenogenesis, while others can reproduce both sexually and parthenogenetically. It's actually more coommn than previously toughht.

Open Cloze

In 2021, _______ at a _________ aquarium were _______ by the birth of a smoothhound shark, who they ______ ______. What shocked them was that, for the last decade, Ispera’s mother had been ______ only with other females. But it’s actually entirely possible that Ispera had no father— and the reason why that is also explains other __________ curiosities, like the _________ of an all-female lizard species.

Usually sexual species have sex cells that contain half the number of chromosomes required to create a viable embryo. So an egg cell must be fertilized by a sperm cell to form two full sets of chromosomes. But some species that have sex cells can _______ a type of asexual reproduction called parthenogenesis— meaning “virgin origin” in Greek. In parthenogenesis, an embryo develops from an unfertilized egg cell that doubles its own chromosome count. In fact, some animals only ever undergo parthenogenesis, while others can reproduce both sexually and parthenogenetically. It's actually more ______ than previously _______.

Solution

undergo
stunned
common
called
workers
ispera
thought
living
sardinian
existence
biological

Original Text

In 2021, workers at a Sardinian aquarium were stunned by the birth of a smoothhound shark, who they called Ispera. What shocked them was that, for the last decade, Ispera’s mother had been living only with other females. But it’s actually entirely possible that Ispera had no father— and the reason why that is also explains other biological curiosities, like the existence of an all-female lizard species.

Usually sexual species have sex cells that contain half the number of chromosomes required to create a viable embryo. So an egg cell must be fertilized by a sperm cell to form two full sets of chromosomes. But some species that have sex cells can undergo a type of asexual reproduction called parthenogenesis— meaning “virgin origin” in Greek. In parthenogenesis, an embryo develops from an unfertilized egg cell that doubles its own chromosome count. In fact, some animals only ever undergo parthenogenesis, while others can reproduce both sexually and parthenogenetically. It's actually more common than previously thought.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation	frequency
lizard species	2
sex cells	2
egg cell	2
genetic material	2
harmful mutations	2
mutational meltdown	2

Important Words

animals
aquarium
asexual
biological
birth
called
cell
cells
chromosome
chromosomes
common
count
create
curiosities
decade
develops
doubles
egg
embryo
existence
explains
fact
females
fertilized
form
full
greek
ispera
living
lizard
meaning
mother
number
parthenogenesis
parthenogenetically
previously
reason
reproduce
reproduction
required
sardinian
sets
sex
sexual
sexually
shark
shocked
smoothhound
species
sperm
stunned
thought
type
undergo
unfertilized
viable
workers