Question: What is the difference between mitosis and meiosis. Why is meiosis necessary?
Solution:
| Meiosis | Mitosis |
| It take place in germ cells of the body. | It takes place in the somatic cells of body. |
| In this the number of chromosomes are reduced by half through the separation of homologous chromosomes which results in the production of two haploid cells. | In this the cells divides in two cells with an equal number of chromosomes in each resulting diploid cell. |
| It helps in maintaining genetic diversity through sexual reproduction. | It helps in normal body growth and repair. |
| The daughter cells produces by this division are genetically different due to the presence of crossing over and pairing of chromosomes. | As the crossing over and pairing of chromosomes does not take place in mitotic division so the produced daughter cells are identical. |
| It occurs in two phases i.e. meiosis I and meiosis II. | It occurs in only one phase. |
Meiosis is very important. It is required to maintain the genetic diversity. It is an important step for sexual reproduction.