Sister and nonsister chromatids behave in distinct ways during meiosis
. We have shown that homologous synapsis does not require the presence
of sister chromatids. In mutants that fail to undergo premeiotic DNA
replication, synaptonemal complex of normal appearance is observed in
diploid nuclei, but not in triploid nuclei. Our results indicate that
homologous alignment does not depend on DNA replication. In addition,
the differences observed in diploid and triploid nuclei indicate that
sister chromatids can exhibit independent synaptic behavior, although
ordinarily, they are constrained to act as a single unit.