Mouse Study Finds Multi-Generational Radiation Effects

If a male mouse is exposed to radiation, its offspring can show an increase in mutations that they pass along to the third generation, researchers have found.

It’s not clear whether the experiment says anything about humans, who generally aren’t exposed to high short-term doses of radiation as the mice were, says researcher Yuri Dubrova of the University of Leicester in England.

“I would not speculate anything about potential implications for humans,” he said in a telephone interview. He and colleagues report the mouse work in the May 4 issue of the journal Nature.

The mutation they monitored isn’t associated with disease, but it may be an indicator of harmful changes, Dubrova said. He also said researchers don’t have a biological explanation for the result.

He and colleagues exposed male mice to radiation and used mating to produce the equivalent of grandchildren. DNA from this last generation was studied to show the rate of mutation passed along by the offspring of the irradiated mice.

The rate of mutations inherited from males was increased sixfold above normal, and from females, 3.5-fold.