Can Sperm Predict Man Age: For the last few days, there has been an uproar in Patna over the death of a student preparing for NEET. Police have claimed that forensic examination of the sperm sample on the undergarment of the deceased student has revealed that this sperm belongs to a boy aged between 18 to 21 years. Now the police is busy identifying that boy. People are angry about this but our focus is on whether science has progressed so much that today we can find out someone’s age from his sperm or sperm samples. To know this, we did something doctors and some scientists Talked to.

It is currently difficult to estimate age from sperm.
Expert Andrologist in diseases related to male reproductive organ in VNA Hospital New Delhi Dr. Vineet Malhotra Told that as per my knowledge till now the age of a man cannot be determined from sperm. We cannot say anything about how he has extracted this data but from sperm we find out what is the age of sperm. Sperm takes 74 days to mature. This can happen in a young man as well as an old man. From this we can say what is the age of the sperm but it is difficult to find out the age of the man. Sperm contains DNA and this DNA is present in every cell of the body. A person can be identified through this DNA. When a person is caught, it can be found out by matching his DNA, but at present it seems difficult to find out the age from sperm. However, age can also be estimated from body hair, bones, teeth, buccal mucosa etc.

How successful was this test?
Associate Professor at Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Bhopal Dr. Chandan Shahi It is said that research shows that the pattern of DNA methylation keeps changing with increasing age. That means it increases on some parts and decreases on others. Scientists can estimate how old a person is by studying these specific changes. This reveals many other things. In some studies, researchers have estimated the age of normal sperm using changes in DNA methylation, but while this is theoretically possible, it seems difficult to do so in practice. There are many reasons for this. Dr. Chandan Shahi Said that first of all it is not an easy task to read the coding of methylation. For this, special expertise is required in this field. Also, very sophisticated equipment is required to understand this process. Although purchasing these devices is not a big deal, India also has these devices but it is very difficult to ascertain its accuracy at present. Since the scientific study regarding this is still in its initial stage, it should be expected that this is practically possible after a few years.

So can’t age really be determined by sperm?
When we did research on this matter, something was said about it in the PubMed Central Journal. According to this research, advanced age of the father badly affects the quality of sperm. To know this, we have to understand DNA methylation and DNA fragmentation. In fact, the quality of sperm decreases in men after a certain age. This deficiency means that there is fragmentation in the DNA chemical structure of the sperm. Simply put, some particles of sperm DNA continue to be released as we age. For example, we are walking with rice in our pocket and due to the hole in the pocket, the rice keeps falling on the way, hence the quantity of rice gets reduced while walking. In the same way, with increasing age, the number of sperm cells starts decreasing. By measuring it properly, the scientist finds out how many particles were released at what age. In scientific language it is called epigenetic marker. In this, as the age of a person increases, these markers decrease. However, it is not as easy as the clinical test.