this post was submitted on 21 Feb 2026
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Tldr:
Oxidative stress resulting in difficulty copying shorter stings appears to result in a higher percentage of longer strings than in younger sperm....
Fuck if I know what that means tho. The article and the research never really got into what the problems are.
This is epigenetics, changes to a genome via stress and environment that are passsed to offspring. We've known for a while that older men have children with autism or schizophrenia more often than young men, and investigating the cause and mechanism like they have in this study will help people have healthier children in the future.
The type of RNA that are involved in this study are regulatory, which means they can help or prevent gene activity, and are very important in the development of an embryo because the egg doesn't have this in abundance like the sperm does
Episgenetics is how the environment effects gene pression...