No direct scientific explanation was ever established that could determine the probable sexual orientation of a biologically male individual, until this novel research finds it. With up to 70 percent accuracy, a program that utilizes epigenetic information can now identify if a male is really straight or not.
Tuck C. Ngun, Ph.D., researcher at the David Geffen School of Medicine of the University of California, Los Angeles, was the principal author of the study. He took the pride of presenting the first study ever that made use of predictive modeling in identifying molecular markers to predict the sexual orientation of a male person, as reported in the press release of ASHG. Although previous studies had provided useful information about the involved chromosomal regions, these results were less precise. This made the team of Dr. Ngun narrow these pre-identified segments down to the level of base pairs in the DNA.
In their methods, researchers studied 37 pairs of identical twins, 10 of which have twins that are both homosexual, and a pair in which a twin is homosexual and the other is heterosexual. Specifically, the team looked at the twins' DNA methylation - which is an epigenetic phenomenon that determines whether an expression of a gene is up-regulated or down-regulated. Since a pair of identical twins has almost the same genetic makeup, researchers stressed on the idea that given the environmental factors the extent of DNA methylation for both twins would appear different.
Dr. Ngun shared that after some initial analyses, over 400,000 data points were gathered - a very large number brought by the twins' high genetic correlation. Out of these data, they did not even know yet which of these differences were useful to predict the sexual orientation. Hence, they devised a program which they called FuzzyForest and successfully found nine important small DNA regions across the whole genome. This algorithm yielded up to 70 percent accuracy in predicting the sexual orientation of the volunteers.
However, as EurekAlert reported, researchers pointed out that although their algorithm can predict the sexual orientation of a male, it may not be necessary still to conclude what really attracts them. What is important is that with this epigenetic profiling, it will not only explain what causes a male to come out either straight or gay, but it will also help everybody to accept or at least understand where they are coming from.
