Can a motherboard's PCIe slot just die?

One of my colleagues asked me about “Bifurcation” when it came in a discussion about running multiple NVMe drives from a single PCIe slot

PCIe Gen3 x16 slot P1-C8 PCIe Gen3 x16 slot P1-C7 PHB 1 e nalpkcaB O I SMP X Bus SMP M S B X Bus PHB0 PCIe Gen3x16 slot P1-C6 PMS s u B A P8 PHB 1

pcle x16 slot The smallest PCIe slot will run at x1 speed, while a full-size PCIe slot will run at x16 PCIe x16 slots are generally intended for use with Graphics Cards

pcle slot The smallest PCIe slot will run at x1 speed, while a full-size PCIe slot will run at x16 PCIe x16 slots are generally intended for use with Graphics Cards