By Shambhavi Saxena:
There’s a connection between fertility and using a laptop, and no, we don’t mean how often you surf adult entertainment sites. We’re talking about how high temperatures from laptops affects your sperm count.
Let’s get the science bit out of the way first.
The reproductive organ that usually develops into the ovaries for people with XX chromosomes is rather different from the organ that usually develops into the testes for people with XY chromosomes. For one thing, it’s primarily the ovaries that produce progesterone and oestrogen, while testes produce testosterone. For another, ovaries are internal, and the testes are not. Why? Because sperm production happens at one degree cooler than body temperature, so evolution decided to locate the testes externally.
And that’s how nature meant to keep sperm safe.
But. But. But. Now, technology has thrown a wet blanket – well actually a hot laptop – over the body’s ‘intelligent design’. And so, it’s actually true that your little guys are at risk for every half hour a laptop stays on your lap!
Don’t believe it? Just ask Dr Suzanne Kavic of the Loyola University Health System or Professor Yelim Sheynkin over at State University of New York. Both of them have led studies that found this to be true.
Having a laptop whirring away on your lap will raise the temperature by 2.5° Centigrade. Two words, friends: “dead sperm”. A Superdrug infographic showed that heat can reduce sperm motility by 8.1% and viability by 9.1%.
But laptops aren’t the only risks to fertility. Prolonged exposure to other high temperature environments, like saunas or hot tubs, can also have the same effect. And infertility can also be caused by numerous other things likes injury, genetics, diet and more.
Even if you never in a million years want to bring a human into this world, and you laugh bravely in the face of masculine displays of virility, you should still worry about hot laptops. Not only is it a sign that the machine is on its way to its inevitable end, it will affect your largest organ (oh stop giggling) which is your skin. Think about it, your skin is literally conducting all the heat from your laptop. At the very least you’re going to give yourself a heat rash or skin irritation in general. All of this is entirely avoidable.
If you wouldn’t stand outdoors concentrating sunlight onto your forehead with a magnifying glass, why concentrate heat onto your junk with a laptop? Choose wisely. The future begs you.
