It is called laptop but men who do not want to jeopardise their ability to have children should avoid balancing it on their laps when working.
In fact, scientists said that man should use laptops as desktops to avoid causing “irreversible or partially reversible changes in their reproductive function.”
According to the study titled, Increase in scrotal temperature in laptop computer users, a combination of the heat generated by a laptop and the position of the thighs on which it is placed lead to higher temperatures around a man‘s genitals and over time can result in low sperm count.
Low sperm count, also called oligospermia, according to information gleaned from www.health.msn.com, means that the semen contains lower sperm cells than normal. The sperm count is considered lower than normal if a man has fewer than 20 million viable sperm cells per millilitre of semen.
A low sperm count decreases the chances of one’s sperm fertilising an egg, resulting in pregnancy. Nonetheless, many men who have low sperm count are still able to father children.
Past researches showed that higher scrotal temperatures can damage sperm cell and affect fertility. The introduction of new technology such as Bluetooth and infrared connections - which provide wireless links to the Internet - has resulted in a growing number of men placing the machines on their thighs rather than on a desk, notes a news story published on the Times of London.
To keep the testicles at an ideal temperature - and for greater comfort - men naturally sit with their legs further apart than women. When working on a laptop, however, they will adopt a less natural position in order to balance it on their laps, which results in a significant rise in body heat between their thighs.
The researchers at the State University of New York, Stonybrook, warned that teenage boys and young men should limit the use of computers on their laps because years of heavy laptop use might cause irreversible or partially reversible changes in male reproductive function. He added, however, that, it was possible that external protective devices could help.
The findings, published in the December 2004 edition of the journal, Human Reproduction, warned that teenagers and young men should consider cutting the time spent with a computer positioned on their laps because of the possible long-term damage to their fertility.
Using 29 volunteers aged 21 to 35, the researchers, led by the director of male infertility and microsurgery at the university, Dr. Yefim Sheynkin, found that sitting with the thighs together to balance a laptop caused scrotal temperatures to rise by 2.1C. But when the laptop was in use, average temperatures rose by 2.6C on the left of the scrotum and 2.8C on the right.
Sheynkin said that laptops could reach internal operating temperatures of more than 70C (158F).The average surface temperature of the computers used in the experiment increased from nearly 31C (87.8F), at the start of the test, to nearly 40C (104F) after one hour.
He said that until further studies provided more information on this type of thermal exposure, teenage boys and young men might consider limiting their use of laptop computers on their laps, as long-term use may have a detrimental effect on their reproductive health.
”The body needs to maintain a proper testicular temperature for normal sperm production and development,” Sheynkin said. ”Portable computers in a laptop position produce scrotal hyperthermia by both the direct heating effect of the computer and the sitting position necessary to balance the computer.” Scrotal hyperthermia leads to decreased fertility, known as clinical subfertility, in men.
Sheynkin noted that it was unclear just how much additional heat could cause scrotal hyperthermia, but past studies suggested that a scrotal temperature increase of more than one degree Celsius above baseline temperatures could have negative effects.
In June 2009, a reproductive specialist at Loyola University Health System, Suzanne Kavic, confirmed that the excessive heat from laptops can affect the male reproductive system.
Kavic who is the director of the reproductive endocrinology department at LUHS and an associate professor in the obstetrics and gynecology division and medicine branch at Loyola University, Chicago Stritch School of Medicine, was quoted by the online science news portal, www.sciencedaily.com as saying that the heat produced by laptops can negatively influence sperm count, “making it difficult to conceive down the road.”
She suggested placing laptops on desks in order to prevent sperm damage and reduce the counts of motility.
A consultant physician at the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital, Cross River State, Dr. Tony Aluka, agreed that balancing a laptop on the laps when working might lead to low sperm count.
He said, “God in his wisdom made the position of the testicles to be lower than the abdomen because inside the abdomen is very hot. And spermatogenesis (the development of sperm cells within the male reproductive organs) needs a temperature lower than that inside the abdomen.
“The laptop generates heat. If a man balances it on his laps when working, the heat it generates will definitely increase the temperature around the testicles. And this may, overtime, reduce spermatogenesis and lead to low sperm count and possible infertility.”
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