PEMBERTON, A. J.; HANSSON, L. J.; BISHOP, J. D. D.; Marine Biological Association of the UK; current address: Danish Institute for Fisheries Research, Charlottenlund, Denmark; Marine Biological Association of the UK: Polyembryony in spermcast simultaneous hermaphrodites: a twinned response to sperm limitation and restricted gene flow ?

Polyembryony, the splitting of a single sexually produced embryo into many clonal copies, seems to get the balance of sexual and asexual reproduction wrong, yet it persists in a diverse range of organisms. The project investigates whether sperm limitation and inbred local population structure may be important for the evolution and maintenance of this life history strategy in cyclostome bryozoans, an entire order of simultaneous hermaphrodites with this mode of reproduction.