According to Professor Stephen Michnick from the Université de Montréal, sexual attraction is simply a molecular mechanism.
We are all attracted to certain types of men or women. Professor Michnick thinks his team has found an explanation for this phenomenon that can explain why people are attracted to each other. The findings are in a study published in the journal Nature.
Researchers used a single cell organism, yeast, for their study. The professor says, "Although yeast is dramatically different from people, at a molecular and cellular level we have a lot in common. The same molecules that create the switching decision in yeast are found in very similar forms in human cells. Similar switching decisions to those made by yeast are made by stem cells during embryonic development and become dysfunctional in cancers."
When yeast decides to mate, it’s due to the modification of a single protein, STE5. This change occurs when the cell is exposed to a pheromone (chemical message produced in most animals). This pheromone activates two enzymes that modify the protein and then provokes the decision to mate or not.
Dr. Michnick adds: "This mating decision is controlled by a simple chemical switch that converts an incoming pheromone signal into a cellular response."