Male and female provide different environment for genital microbes
Artur Plawgo/Getty Pictures
Sexual partners move their specific genital microbiomes each to each other during sexual intercourse, a discovery that may be implications for forensic examination of sexual attacks.
Brandon chapman Perth, at the University of Murdoch in Western Australia, and his colleagues collected swabs from the genitals of 12 acras, heterosexual joints, then used RNA gene sequencing to identify microbial signatures for each participant. Researchers asked the joints to avoid sex between two days and two weeks, and took follow -up samples a few hours after intercourse.
“We found that those genetic signatures from the female’s bacteria were detected in their male partners and on the contrary,” Chapman says. This change in a person’s “sexom”, as the team dubbed it, can prove useful in criminal investigation, they say.
The amount of transfer varies from couple to couple, and the team also found that condoms are not even used, completely preventing the movement of sexom from one partner to another. However, a large range of results was that during a period the female sexome changed significantly.
Chapman says that even though for a long time, the microbiome of monotonous joints may have some symmetry, but the population of bacteria varies clearly between sexes.
Says Chapman, “We have the great advantage with penile and vaginal microbiomes that due to the huge differences in two environment, we observe very different bacterial types on each,” says Chapman. “For example, the penis is mostly skin -like surface and thus reflects similarity with skin microbiomes. We see anaerobic bacteria type in vagina and aerobic types on the penis. ,
For example, many of these bacteria cannot remain indefinitely in the opposite environment, they say. “It is like comparing land and marine animals – there are some that live especially in one or the other place and if removed they die, but anything that goes on with joy and stays in the middle . “
After establishing the transfer of bacteria during intercourse, the team is now hoping to prove that a person’s sexom is unique, such as fingerprint or DNA. “I think there is sufficient variety and specificity inherent within everyone’s sexom, but for us it still has a little work to showcase that with a technique that is strong enough to meet the challenges of forensic science , “Says Chapman.
If the researchers are able to prove this, it can aid in an examination of the sexual attack, especially in which a male does not ejaculate suspected ejaculation, uses a male sterilization or a condom. “Bacterial genetic profile may be able to oppose or oppose proposals or admirers about what happened in alleged sexual harassment cases,” Dennis McCenvin Sydney at the University of Technology, in Australia.
The standard profiles of human DNA will always be preferred in such cases because due to their great power to distinguish between individuals, they say, but sexom can provide a useful option. “Bacterial genetic profiles may one day complement DNA evidence or even in rare cases a sexual attack can help indicate a criminal where DNA profiles are not available,” says Mackevin.
Subject:
(Tagstotransite) Forensic (T) Sex
