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Fathering sons, daughters may be in man's genes

China Daily | Updated: 2009-01-03 07:58

A UK researcher has a new explanation for how the human race manages to keep a fairly even balance of males and females, despite massive deaths of young males in war and selective abortion of female fetuses in certain parts of the world.

Corry Gellatly, a research scientist at Newcastle University, proposes that there's a gene that determines whether a man will father more sons, more daughters, or equal numbers of each. When females are in short supply, they have a better chance of snagging a mate, and are thus more likely to pass the gene for fathering daughters on to their offspring. And when men are scarce, they have a better chance of mating and passing along the gene for having sons.

"It's kind of a counter-balancing mechanism," Gellatly explained. "You can't get a population that becomes too skewed toward males or too skewed toward females."

Fathering sons, daughters may be in man's genes

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