Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons
The birth sex ratio of vertebrates with chromosomal sex determination has been shown to respond to environmental variability, such as temperature. However, in humans the few previous studies on environmental temperature and birth sex ratios have produced mixed results. We examined whether reconstruc...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:2412929 2023-05-15T17:42:27+02:00 Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons Helle, Samuli Helama, Samuli Jokela, Jukka 2007-11-27 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2412929 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18042510 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 en eng The Royal Society http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2412929 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18042510 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 © 2007 The Royal Society Research Article Text 2007 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 2013-09-01T23:36:47Z The birth sex ratio of vertebrates with chromosomal sex determination has been shown to respond to environmental variability, such as temperature. However, in humans the few previous studies on environmental temperature and birth sex ratios have produced mixed results. We examined whether reconstructed annual mean temperatures were associated with annual offspring sex ratio at birth in the eighteenth to nineteenth century Sami from northern Finland. We found that warm years correlated with a male-biased sex ratio, whereas a warm previous year skewed sex ratio towards females. The net effect of one degree Celsius increase in mean temperature during these 2 years corresponded to approximately 1% more sons born annually. Although the physiological and ecological mechanisms mediating these effects and their evolutionary consequences on parental fitness remain unknown, our results show that environmental temperature may affect human birth sex ratio. Text Northern Finland sami PubMed Central (PMC) Biology Letters 4 1 60 62 |
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Research Article |
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Research Article Helle, Samuli Helama, Samuli Jokela, Jukka Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
topic_facet |
Research Article |
description |
The birth sex ratio of vertebrates with chromosomal sex determination has been shown to respond to environmental variability, such as temperature. However, in humans the few previous studies on environmental temperature and birth sex ratios have produced mixed results. We examined whether reconstructed annual mean temperatures were associated with annual offspring sex ratio at birth in the eighteenth to nineteenth century Sami from northern Finland. We found that warm years correlated with a male-biased sex ratio, whereas a warm previous year skewed sex ratio towards females. The net effect of one degree Celsius increase in mean temperature during these 2 years corresponded to approximately 1% more sons born annually. Although the physiological and ecological mechanisms mediating these effects and their evolutionary consequences on parental fitness remain unknown, our results show that environmental temperature may affect human birth sex ratio. |
format |
Text |
author |
Helle, Samuli Helama, Samuli Jokela, Jukka |
author_facet |
Helle, Samuli Helama, Samuli Jokela, Jukka |
author_sort |
Helle, Samuli |
title |
Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
title_short |
Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
title_full |
Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
title_fullStr |
Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
title_full_unstemmed |
Temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical Sami: warm years bring more sons |
title_sort |
temperature-related birth sex ratio bias in historical sami: warm years bring more sons |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2007 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2412929 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18042510 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 |
genre |
Northern Finland sami |
genre_facet |
Northern Finland sami |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2412929 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18042510 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 |
op_rights |
© 2007 The Royal Society |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0482 |
container_title |
Biology Letters |
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4 |
container_issue |
1 |
container_start_page |
60 |
op_container_end_page |
62 |
_version_ |
1766144307520077824 |