Final answer:
Daughter cells are identical to the parent cell after mitosis but are not identical after meiosis. Mitosis produces two diploid daughter cells with identical genetic information, while meiosis generates four unique haploid cells.
Step-by-step explanation:
Whether daughter cells are identical to the parent cell depends on the type of cell division that created them. In the case of mitosis, which occurs in somatic cells, the daughter cells are generally identical to the parent cell.
During mitosis, cytokinesis separates duplicated chromosomes to create two daughter cells which are both diploid and identical to the parent cell, maintaining the same genetic information.
However, in meiosis, the process results in daughter cells that are not identical to the parent cell.
Meiosis involves two rounds of cell division resulting in four haploid cells, each with one set of chromosomes, hence each daughter cell is genetically unique due to the independent assortment of chromosomes during metaphase I and the possibility of crossing over between homologous chromosomes.
Therefore, the two sets of daughter chromosomes are identical to each other after mitosis, but this is not the case after meiosis. After mitosis, eukaryotic cells produce two genetically identical daughter cells, whereas meiosis in a diploid cell results in four genetically distinct haploid cells.