Women, Now Men Has a Biological Clock

So like women, men have a biological clock .  A new study suggests children with psychiatric disorder is linked to the father's advanced age.

Compared to younger fathers, older fathers' children were found to be significantly more at risk for a host of psychiatric disorders, according to the study, published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Psychiatry.

For example, the children of fathers ages 45 and over were three times more likely to have an autism spectrum disorder, 13 times more likely to have ADHD, and 24 times more likely to have bipolar disorder than the children of fathers aged 20 to 24.

For the study, researchers analyzed data from 2.6 million children born in Sweden between 1973 and 2001, making it one of the largest and most comprehensive studies on the effects of paternal age.

"The working hypothesis is that as men get older and their sperm continue to replicate, that there are more chances of having mutations in the base pairs of the DNA," says Brian D'Onofrio, lead study author and associate professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University.

"Those genetic mutations are associated with psychiatric problems."

The age-related effects were gradual, researchers found; a 35-year-old man's child had greater risks than the child of a 25-year-old man.