kønscelle

Kønscelle is the Danish term for a gamete, which is a mature haploid male or female germ cell that is able to unite with another of the opposite sex in sexual reproduction to form a zygote. In animals, the female gamete is typically the ovum (egg cell) and the male gamete is the sperm. In plants, the female gamete is the ovule and the male gamete is pollen.

Gametes are produced through a process called meiosis, a type of cell division that reduces the number of chromosomes in the parent cell by half. This ensures that when two gametes fuse during fertilization, the resulting zygote has the correct diploid number of chromosomes. For humans, this means gametes have 23 chromosomes, and the zygote has 46.

The production of male gametes is called spermatogenesis, and it occurs in the testes. The production of female gametes is called oogenesis, and it occurs in the ovaries. Both processes involve meiosis and result in the formation of haploid cells, each carrying half the genetic material of the parent organism.

The union of a male and female gamete is called fertilization. This process restores the diploid chromosome number and initiates the development of a new individual. The genetic material contributed by each gamete combines to determine the characteristics of the offspring.