Question

In meiosis, chromosome number becomes
A. One half of parent cell
B. Same as the parent cell
C. One-fourth of the parent cell
D. Double that of the parent cell

Answer 1

Hint: Cell division is of two types. They are meiosis and mitosis. Mitosis is the somatic cell division which is also called equational cell division that occurs in a single step. Meiosis is the reduction division and occurs in two stages.

Complete answer:
Meiosis is a special type of cell division in which chromosome number is halved to produce haploid daughter cells from diploid cells. During the interphase, the amount of DNA is doubled while the number of chromosomes is unchanged. It then undergoes meiosis I. After this stage, the amount of DNA will be half of that in the interphase. Keep in mind that the number of chromosomes is halved along with this.
In other words, if the amount of DNA was 2C before entering the cell division, it becomes 4C in
interphase and again becomes 2C after meiosis I. Meanwhile, if the number of chromosomes was 2n before entering cell division, it is unchanged in interphase but is halved after meiosis 1 and becomes 1n.
After meiosis 2, the amount of DNA is again reduced by half and becomes 1C, while the chromosome number is the same, that is 1n. After meiosis 2, we can see that both chromosome number and amount of DNA is reduced by half from that of the mother cell. Note that while comparing the amount of DNA in the G2 phase, which is in the interphase, DNA content is decreased by four times, and the number of chromosomes is just halved.
So, the correct option will be A.

Note: Meiosis division happens in two cycles. They are meiosis I and meiosis II. Know that although meiosis is different from mitosis, the second step of meiosis is similar to mitosis. Mitosis is also called an equational cell division.