Researchers find male DNA inside female brains

A new research led by a Canadian scientist has discovered male DNA inside the female brain, and raises the hypothesis that in case male DNA creeps into s a woman’s brain, then it might have some masculinizing affect on the brain of the female.

In a press release, the study was described under headline "Men on the mind: Study finds male DNA in women's brains". But, the title is somewhat misleading, as it doesn’t aim to indicate that women were thinking about men.

Rather, the team of researchers studied the brains of 59 women, who died between the 32 and 101 years of age, and discovered male DNA in the brains of 63 per cent of the subjects.

The researchers called the phenomenon male microchimerism. They suspected that the male DNA in female brains had come from a male fetus that the women might have carried at some point of time in their lives. However, they were not cent per cent sure of that because they did not have pregnancy histories for all the participants.

The researchers also found that women suffering from Alzheimer’s ailment had less male DNA in their brains than women without Alzheimer’s.

The study, which is the first to discover the presence of male microchimerism in women’s brains, has been published in the latest edition of the journal PLOS ONE.