Children Help Their Mothers for Decades

Itninja writes "NPR reported this morning on some interesting findings regarding mothers and their children. From the article: 'Some scientists have proposed that when a woman has a baby, she gets not just a son or a daughter, but a gift of cells that stays behind and protects her for the rest of her life. That's because a baby's cells linger in its mom's body for decades and -- like stem cells -- may help to repair damage when she gets sick. It's such an enticing idea that even the scientists who came up with the idea worry that it may be too beautiful to be true.'"

Comments

I wonder

[netfool]

I wonder if this has anything to do with women living on average, seven years longer than men?

Re:I wonder

[Firehed]

Nope, I'm pretty sure that's more due to the fact that they don't do stupid things as often. Let's be honest here, men are pretty wreckless. How many women do you know go cliffjumping or start street racing just because of the type of car that pulled up next to her at the stop light?

Re:I wonder

[Vellmont]

Nope, I'm pretty sure that's more due to the fact that they don't do stupid things as often.

If that were true you'd see a big gender difference at the young ages that men are doing reckless things. That isn't true, and the gender disparity only shows up much later in life. I'm not sure why the difference exists, but I've heard that women get heart disease much less often than men because of the protective effects of estrogen.

Re:I wonder

[BewireNomali]

Women have higher resting serum levels of growth hormone than men until menopause when they fall. That's where the seven extra years plus come from.

women get extra time because they reproduce. males are overproduced, so we can afford to waste a few doing stupid shit, like you mentioned.

Re:I wonder

[hackstraw]

Nope, I'm pretty sure that's more due to the fact that they don't do stupid things as often. Let's be honest here, men are pretty wreckless. How many women do you know go cliffjumping or start street racing just because of the type of car that pulled up next to her at the stop light?

That is called risk taking. It used to be a valued human male characteristic before being a pussy became the norm.

Risk taking does things like put men on the moon, explore new territory when others believe the world is flat, riot and form new governments, etc.

But, I digress. The woman's way is the right way.

Re:I wonder

[Empty Yo]

Statistically speaking, if you remove deaths due to work accidents, vehicle accidents and war from the death statistics, then men live with a half a year of women. Those three factors combined pretty much account for the seven year difference.

Re:Double Edged Sword

[JesseL]

I wonder if they may also end up seeding cancers.

reminds me of a csi episode

[circletimessquare]

i just saw

a guy is fingered for a rape/ murder, so they check his dna against the crime scene dna and find out that he doesn't match 100%, but 50%, implying his brother did the crime

so csi seeks out all of the guy's brothers, including a crazy homeless schizophrenic one, but none of them match the dna 100% either

until the lead csi guy figures out what is really going on: the guy is a chimera

a chimera is a very very rare person where two eggs/ embryos fuse very early in embryonic development, such that only one person results, but one person where different organ systems in the body are from different genetic makeups, in essence, two brothers becoming one man

for example, the person's brain and bone marrow might be of person a, but the skin and eggs/ testicles might be of person b

so it is possible, for example, to have a child that is genetically your nephew/ niece, if only your brother's testicles are left of him and you are a chimera

the point is, the body is very well able to be made of different genetic lineages, without all of the usual immunological tissue rejection issues and such