xenoparous

From Latin xeno- (“strangeness”) + pariō (“give birth, produce, bring forth”), equivalent to xeno- +‎ -parous. Coined by Yannick Juvé and colleagues in 2025.^[1]

• IPA^(key): /ˈzɛn.əpərəs/

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xenoparous (not comparable)

1. (biology) Of or relating to a reproductive strategy in which a female produces offspring of a different species without a process of hybridization.
   • 2025 September 3, Y. Juvé, C. Lutrat, A. Ha, et al., “One mother for two species via obligate cross-species cloning in ants”, in Nature‎^[1], →DOI, archived from the original on 23 September 2025:

     We suggest defining such females as xenoparous, meaning they need to produce individuals of another species as part of their life cycle. This shows the evolution of xenoparity (xeno-, meaning ‘foreign, strange, different’, and -parity, meaning ‘produce, bring forth, give birth’), which is the need to propagate another species’ genome by means of its own eggs. […] We suggest defining such females as xenoparous, meaning they need to produce individuals of another species as part of their life cycle.

   • 2025 September 7, “Unbelievable discovery: Queen ants produce offspring of two different species, say scientists”, in The Times of India‎^[2], archived from the original on 9 September 2025:

     In a discovery that sounds almost like science fiction, scientists have found that queen ants of the Iberian harvester species (Messor ibericus) can produce offspring not just of their own kind but from an entirely different species. This rare phenomenon, called xenoparous reproduction, has never been observed before in the animal kingdom.

• xenoparity