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COPENHAGEN, Denmark - New research raises the possibility a genetic test may be able to tell young women whether they can afford to delay motherhood while they get their careers on track.
In a study presented Tuesday at a European fertility conference, scientists reported some women who find it easy to conceive after age 45 have a special genetic profile.
Scientists always suspected genes must help those rare "superbreeders" to defy the odds and get pregnant over and over again late in life, but this is the first time it has been proven, said Dr. Hans Evers, former chairman of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology.
Evers, who wasn't involved in the research, said the findings could help women avoid the disappointment of discovering too late that they have become infertile.
"If you can say with a test, "You personally are at high risk of infertility by 35,' then that would work," said Evers, a professor at Academic University in the Netherlands.
For most women, fertility gradually declines until age 37, after which it plummets.
In the study, Dr. Neri Laufer from Haddassah University Hospital in Jerusalem, selected from a group of 250 Ashkenazi Jewish women who gave birth after age 45.
The researchers looked for differences in the genes between eight women who had conceived after 45 and six women of the same age who had their last baby by age 30.
They found blood samples from all eight women who became pregnant after 45 had an unusual genetic profile that did not exist in the other women. Less than 50 genes were responsible for the difference. They all tended to protect against DNA damage and early cell death.