Although the biological impact of this foreign DNA is unclear, the study also found that women with more male DNA in their brains were less likely to have suffered from Alzheimer’s disease — hinting that the male DNA could help protect the mothers from the disease, the researchers say.

 

During mammalian pregnancy, the mother and fetus exchange DNA and cells. Previous work has shown that fetal cells can linger in the mother’s blood and bone for decades, a condition researchers call fetal microchimerism. The lingering of the fetal DNA, research suggests, may be a mixed blessing for a mom: The cells may benefit the mother’s health — by promoting tissue repair and improving the immune system — but may also cause adverse effects, such as autoimmune reactions.

One question is how leftover fetal cells affect the brain. Researchers have shown that fetal microchimerism occurs in mouse brains, but they had not shown this in humans. So a team led by autoimmunity researcher and rheumatologist J. Lee Nelson of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, took samples from autopsied brains of 59 women who died between the ages of 32 and 101. By testing for a gene specific to the Y chromosome, they found evidence of male DNA in the brains of 63 percent of the women. (The researchers did not have the history of the women’s pregnancies.) The male DNA was scattered across multiple brain regions, the team reports online today in PLoS ONE.