It has long been debated whether or not homosexuality is genetic. Now researchers at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, say they’ve found a clue that may unlock the mystery. It lies in something called epigenetics—how gene expression is regulated by temporary switches. A working group at the National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis (NIMBioS), based at UT, used mathematical modeling that found the transmission of sex-specific epi-marks may signal homosexuality. Sergey Gavrilets, paper co-author, joint professor of math and ecology and evolutionary biology and NIMBioS’s associate director for scientific activities, has been interviewed by multiple media outlets worldwide about the research.
- US News and World Report: Scientists May Have Finally Unlocked Puzzle of Why People Are Gay
- Knoxville News Sentinel/AP: UT Experts: Can Homosexuality Be Inherited?
- Fox News: Homosexuality Ultimately a Result of Gene Regulation, Researchers Find
- World Science: “Epigenetics” Proposed to Underlie Homosexuality
- Salon.com: There is No Gay Gene
- Cosmos Magazine: Homosexuality Starts in the Womb
- Examiner: “Gay Gene” Believed Altered in Womb by Epi-Marks
- TIME: New Insight into the (Epi)Genetic Roots of Homosexuality
- Popular Science: Could Scientists Have Found a Gay Switch?
- VOXXI: Homosexuality Switch, Not Gene, Passed From Parent to Child
- CNN’s AC360: Study: Homosexuality Can Be Passed Down
- Itar-Tass, the main news agency in Russia