May/December Couples Boost Human Lifespan - Yahoo! News
How it works
Women often lose their reproductive capacity around age 50, but if men can still reproduce into their 70s, Darwin would say it's advantageous for males to live longer lives providing they can hook up with a woman capable of reproducing. Natural selection should favor longevity-boosting genes, which would get passed down from fathers to both sons and daughters. So women would benefit as well in future generations, the scientists say.
Result: Over time, the older-guy-with-younger-gal lifestyle would lift the lifespan ceiling for both men and women in the next generations and so on.
"By increasing the survival of men you have a spillover effect on women because men pass their genes to children of both sexes," said study team member Cedric Puleston, a doctoral candidate at Stanford University.
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