Gay men’s genes promote fertility in women

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Gay men’s genes promote fertility in women

- By Our London Correspondent

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London: The biological enigma of how homosexuality evolved despite its

obvious drawbacks for reproduction may finally have been resolved. The genes

that make men gay also help their female relatives to have bigger families,

according to new research.

 

Scientists have discovered that gay men’s mothers, sisters and maternal

aunts tend to have significantly more children than the norm — and that many

of their nephews and male cousins are also gay.

 

The findings suggest that the same genes that trigger homosexuality in men

also promote fertility in women, and that this could explain how they

survive in the population when gay men themselves are unlikely to breed. The

genes are instead passed on through the female line and the enhanced

fertility they confer on these women ensures that they are inherited by

plenty of children. Some of these sons will grow up to be homosexual

themselves.

 

The study also revealed that gay men are more likely than heterosexuals to

have a gay male relative, though only on their mother’s side of the family.

The results, from the University of Padua, in Italy, offer strong support

for the theory that homosexuality is at least partly determined by a person’

s genetic make-up, and is not just about personal choice or upbringing and

environment.

 

It also suggests an elegant solution to the biggest problem with this

hypothesis — the " Darwinian paradox " that any genes that favour

homosexuality ought to have died out through natural selection, as those

that inherited them had fewer and fewer offspring.

 

Andrea Camperio-Ciani, who led the research, said: " Our data resolve this

paradox by showing that there might be hitherto unexpected reproductive

advantages associated with male homosexuality. "

 

The work also points to a likely location for the genes that have this

effect: they almost certainly lie on the X chromosome, the package of DNA

that men always inherit from their mothers.

 

In the study, published on Wednesday in the journal Proceedings of the Royal

Society, Dr Camperio-Ciani’s team interviewed 98 homosexual and 100

heterosexual men in detail about their extended families. In total, more

than 4,600 individuals were thus indirectly involved.

 

They found that both the mothers and maternal aunts of the homosexuals were

significantly more fertile than those of the straight men: the mothers had

an average of 2.69 children compared with 2.32, and the aunts 1.98 children

compared with 1.51. Fertility rates among paternal relatives and among male

relatives on the mother’s side were similar for both groups.

 

 

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