Stephen T. answered • 01/23/21
High School Science Teacher.
During sexual reproduction the male of the species produces a specialized cell type called a gamete. The gamete produced by the male is called a sperm cell. The male release millions of sperm cells during intercourse but only one cell will fertilzed the female gamete. The female gamete is refered to as an ovum.
During sexual intercorse, the sperm cell with fertilize(penetrate) the female ovum and the resultant cell is called a zygote. The zygote will develop in the mother's uterus until it developed enough for the mother to give birth.
The division process leading to the devolopment both male and femal gametes in called meosis and involves two rounds of cellular division. The division process in males produces four gentically unique sperm. The process of cellular in females leads to only one viable ovum. Note that there are multilpe cycle of division occuring daily over a human life cycle resulting in millions of sperm cell made daily, and hundreds of ova made over a life time. The number of sperm produced by males in unlimited. However, the numbers of ova a female can make is limited. Males can produce sperm daily until they die. However, a female will eventually run out of ova. This is called menopuase.
