Higher paternal age at offspring conception increases de novo genetic mutations. Based on evolutionary genetic theory we predicted older fathers' children, all else equal, would be less likely to survive and reproduce, i.e. have lower fitness. In sibling control studies, we find support for negative paternal age effects on offspring survival and reproductive success across four large population...

OBJECTIVE Differential effects of maternal and paternal posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have been observed in adult offspring of Holocaust survivors in both glucocorticoid receptor sensitivity and vulnerability to psychiatric disorder. The authors examined the relative influences of maternal and paternal PTSD on DNA methylation of the exon 1F promoter of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR-1F)...

Historically, less attention has been paid to paternal effects on early embryogenesis than maternal effects. However, it is now apparent that certain male factor infertility phenotypes are associated with increased DNA fragmentation and/or chromosome aneuploidies that may compromise early embryonic development. In addition, there is a growing body of evidence that the fertilizing sperm has more...

It is widely recognized that maternal phenotype can have important effects on offspring, but paternal phenotype is generally assumed to have no influence in animals lacking paternal care. Nonetheless, selection may favour the transfer of environmentally acquired condition to offspring from both parents. Using a split-brood, cross-generational laboratory design, we manipulated a key environmenta...

Fertility is a discrete trait with two categories (1, successful mating, 0, unsuccessful mating). A Bayesian analysis with a binary threshold animal model has been performed with 18 695 AI mating records from 1987 to 1997, concerning 4085 sows and 187 boars. The pedigree included all individuals genetically linked with data. The binary response was modeled under a probit approach. The model for...

Though there are multiple routes through which parents can influence their offspring, recent studies of environmentally induced epigenetic variation have highlighted the role of non-genomic pathways. In addition to the experience-dependent modification of DNA methylation that can be achieved via mother-infant interactions, there has been increasing interest in the epigenetic mechanisms through ...

OBJECTIVE Advanced paternal age (APA) at conception has been linked with autism and schizophrenia in offspring, neurodevelopmental disorders that affect social functioning. The current study explored the effects of paternal age on social development in the general population. METHOD We used multilevel growth modeling to investigate APA effects on socioemotional development from early childhoo...

The existence of genetic variation in offspring size in plants and animals is puzzling because offspring size is often strongly associated with fitness and expected to be under stabilizing selection. An explanation for variation in seed size is conflict between parents and between parents and offspring. However, for this hypothesis to be true, it must be shown that the offspring genotype can af...