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Men who park a hot computer on their laps for hours every day may be reducing their chances of becoming fathers.
A pilot study of 29 men shows that the combination of the legs-together posture required to balance a laptop, and the heat generated by the processor elevates scrotal temperature by up to 2.8°C during use. Yefim Sheynkin, who led the team at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, US, now plans to test whether such exposure directly affects sperm quality and fertility.
A general association between elevated testicular temperature and lowered fertility is well documented. The effects of heat on sperm quality are transient, so would-be dads are often advised to avoid hot baths, saunas or wearing tight warm pants if they are trying to conceive with their partners.
But Sheynkin says his work suggests that the increasing popularity of laptops may also be a risk factor for infertility. "It's a unique situation with laptop computers," he says. "This is not a short term, occasional exposure, but a repetitive use of a computer, with the same heat exposure, a couple of times a day for many years, for a whole new generation of men."
"It makes perfect sense, but no one had thought about the fertility effect of a hot computer on your lap," says Marc Goldstein, a fertility expert at Cornell University Weill Medical College in New York City, US. "It's going to be a very hot topic." Goldstein has worked with Sheynkin before, but did not participate in the current study.
"It's a provocative study," says Paul Turek, a male fertility specialist at University of California, San Francisco. "I'm hoping people do take note of it, so we can start to assess the clinical meaning of it."
Burned penis
Sheynkin says the study was suggested to him by a medical student attending his class on the causes of infertility. The student pointed out how much heat the machines generate - they can achieve an internal operating temperature of more than 70°C - and how much time men now spend with laptops resting near their genitals.
But the only previous scientific paper on the impact of warm laptops on male reproductive organs was a 2002 anecdotal report published in The Lancet (vol 360, p 1704) of a scientist who suffered burns to his penis and scrotum after using one.
So Sheynkin designed a controlled experiment where healthy male volunteers aged 21 to 35 were asked to sit in a laptop-using posture for one hour either with or without a working computer resting on their legs. Electronic sensors taped to the right and left testes were used to measure temperature every three minutes.
Even without the computer present, body heat from the men's thighs raised the temperature of the scrotum by 2.1°C. With the computer present, the temperature could climb another 0.7°C.
Previous studies suggest that such a temperature rise is enough to briefly impact sperm quality and fertility, but Sheynkin plans to measure these effects directly in future studies. He has also started asking his patients who are having trouble conceiving about their computer habits - which sometimes catches them by surprise. "Until now, of course, they put a computer on their lap without a second thought about it," he says.
While Turek agrees that the subject demands further study, his instinct is that laptop use has, at most, a subtle effect on fertility. "I live near Silicon Valley . If this was having a pervasive effect, I'm sure we would have noticed it here," he says.
Men who park a hot computer on their laps for hours every day may be reducing their chances of becoming fathers.
A pilot study of 29 men shows that the combination of the legs-together posture required to balance a laptop, and the heat generated by the processor elevates scrotal temperature by up to 2.8°C during use. Yefim Sheynkin, who led the team at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, US, now plans to test whether such exposure directly affects sperm quality and fertility.
A general association between elevated testicular temperature and lowered fertility is well documented. The effects of heat on sperm quality are transient, so would-be dads are often advised to avoid hot baths, saunas or wearing tight warm pants if they are trying to conceive with their partners.
But Sheynkin says his work suggests that the increasing popularity of laptops may also be a risk factor for infertility. "It's a unique situation with laptop computers," he says. "This is not a short term, occasional exposure, but a repetitive use of a computer, with the same heat exposure, a couple of times a day for many years, for a whole new generation of men."
"It makes perfect sense, but no one had thought about the fertility effect of a hot computer on your lap," says Marc Goldstein, a fertility expert at Cornell University Weill Medical College in New York City, US. "It's going to be a very hot topic." Goldstein has worked with Sheynkin before, but did not participate in the current study.
"It's a provocative study," says Paul Turek, a male fertility specialist at University of California, San Francisco. "I'm hoping people do take note of it, so we can start to assess the clinical meaning of it."
Burned penis
Sheynkin says the study was suggested to him by a medical student attending his class on the causes of infertility. The student pointed out how much heat the machines generate - they can achieve an internal operating temperature of more than 70°C - and how much time men now spend with laptops resting near their genitals.
But the only previous scientific paper on the impact of warm laptops on male reproductive organs was a 2002 anecdotal report published in The Lancet (vol 360, p 1704) of a scientist who suffered burns to his penis and scrotum after using one.
So Sheynkin designed a controlled experiment where healthy male volunteers aged 21 to 35 were asked to sit in a laptop-using posture for one hour either with or without a working computer resting on their legs. Electronic sensors taped to the right and left testes were used to measure temperature every three minutes.
Even without the computer present, body heat from the men's thighs raised the temperature of the scrotum by 2.1°C. With the computer present, the temperature could climb another 0.7°C.
Previous studies suggest that such a temperature rise is enough to briefly impact sperm quality and fertility, but Sheynkin plans to measure these effects directly in future studies. He has also started asking his patients who are having trouble conceiving about their computer habits - which sometimes catches them by surprise. "Until now, of course, they put a computer on their lap without a second thought about it," he says.
While Turek agrees that the subject demands further study, his instinct is that laptop use has, at most, a subtle effect on fertility. "I live near Silicon Valley . If this was having a pervasive effect, I'm sure we would have noticed it here," he says.
