What is hybridization: is it a natural or artificial process?

Unfortunately, our school system of education focuses on exact sciences, often completely forgetting about the natural sciences. As a result, the vast majority of school graduates do not know the basic principles of biology at all. It would seem that nothing is wrong: after all, we do not often see it in our daily life ... However, this is not the case. For example, do you know what hybridization is? Is it a natural or man-made process? What is it for and is it not dangerous for us?

But as a result of ignorance of such alphabet truths, various bureaus that produce "miracle-drugs", "natural foods" and other nonsense are widely spread and flourish, restraining (among other things) the absence of hybrid organisms in their products. Let's try to understand in more detail these burning issues.

To begin with, hybridization is a completely natural biological process. Hybridization is the process of obtaining a hybrid: an organism obtained as a result of pairing or perepylyleniya two different species. It can be natural and artificial. Of course, as a result of the natural process, viable organisms that can produce prolific offspring are much more often obtained.

There are several reasons for this. As a rule, natural (natural) hybridization is a process of crossing two closely related species or subspecies. This occurs quite often, often leading to the disappearance and assimilation of one of the parental species. An ideal example of such a process is the absorption of island animals by close species from the continent with their deliberate (with the help of a human) or accidental entry there. Endemics are quickly "swallowed" by more aggressive and powerful relatives.

However, in some cases, the same process can lead to the formation of a completely new species. This is possible again if a certain population hits the island or other hard-to-reach place. For a long time, when representatives of the same species from the continent get to this population from time to time, a new subspecies or even a species of animals or plants appears. It takes a long time, but this is how endemics appeared. In this case, hybridization is a jogging mechanism of speciation.

However, this process is more often artificial. The reason for this is that a person is extremely interested in creating species that have certain characteristics. This type of hybridization is known since antiquity. This is how many varieties of cereals, breeds of cattle and horses were bred. It can be said that humanity is strongly obliged to hybrids, since they possessed a higher yield and better economic qualities, which ultimately predetermined the development of agriculture and science.

At present, hybridization of somatic cells is becoming more common : it is the process of crossing two non-sex cells of completely different species. For example, this way you can get a hybrid mouse with a frog. This method is used not only to study the prospects of cellular engineering, but also to develop new drugs.