What is the difference between meiosis in males and meiosis in females?

Question

Meiosis in males produces sperm. The process is called spermatogenesis. A diploid spermatocyte will undergo the entire process of meiosis to produce four haploid cells. Then these cells become specialized: they lose most of their organelles, and develop a flagellum for locomotion.

Meiosis in females produces ova (egg cells). This is called oogenesis. The process of meiosis occurs but differs from spermatogenesis in that only one egg cell is produced int he end, due to an unequal division of cytoplasm during meiosis I and II.

Answer 1

Yes, this is true. Spermatogenesis will result in 4 sperm (classic meiosis), but oogenesis will result in only 1 egg. This is due to uneven distribution of the cytoplasm in the oocyte. At each stage of meiosis, the oocyte will create one healthy daughter cell (the one with a large majority of the cytoplasm), but the other daughter cell- called a "polar body", will essentially only consist of the other half of the DNA, and no longer participate in the next stages of oogenesis. This ensures that the final resulting daughter cell after Meiosis 2 contains enough cytoplasm support the resulting zygote after fertilization. Sperm on the other hand are essentially just transporter cells for the haploid DNA they carry. Therefore they can be much smaller and their primary functions are all focused around motility. Also, due to the high attrition of sperm in the female reproductive tract, it is necessary to make as many as possible as to improve the odds that at least one can make it to the oocyte. Hope this helps!