Ancestry & Evolution
The desire to understand our origins is primal. By examining our DNA over successive generations through the evolutionary process of inherited characteristics of human and animal populations–as well as from those species from which humans share a common ancestry–we can decipher our individual and collective past and develop medical innovations for the future.
Below is the complete archive of related articles sorted by date.
Tiny genetic alteration linked to devastatingly large brain size
An international collaboration led by scientists and doctors from the UK, Netherlands and United States has identified a new genetic ...
Antarctic glaciers may be hiding undiscovered life
Is there an undiscovered colony of plants, algae and small animals living in caves beneath glaciers in the Antarctic? That’s ...
Genetic obesity risk influenced by lifestyle as well as DNA
The risk for developing obesity is influenced by our lifestyle as well as our genes. In a new study from ...
Physicist Nigel Goldenfeld: Life started with physics, not biology
[Editor's note: The following is part of an interview with Nigel Goldenfeld, director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute for Universal Biology ...
Brain ‘flexibility’ could help explain why people learn differently
As a person learns, connections between brain regions can change. Some neural partners connect, then split apart […]; others form ...
Is evolution still happening in modern humans?
Though it may take millions of years for complex traits to evolve, say allowing humans to walk on two legs, ...
De-extinction: How far should humans go in resurrecting lost species?
The science of resurrecting lost species takes many forms, but collectively it has become known as “de-extinction.” According to advocates ...
Life 3.0: What happens when AI becomes ‘master of its own destiny’?
[Editor's note: Max Tegmark is a physicist at MIT. The following is part of an excerpt from his new book, Life 3.0: ...
Older mini-brains could boost study of autism, schizophrenia
[Sergiu Paşca, a neuroscientist at Stanford University] has joined other researchers in growing little balls of human brain tissue, about ...
Marriage changes everything–including your personality
[R]esearch suggests the experience of committing to and settling down with another person really does change our personalities for better ...
Video: DNA ancestry tests help fill in African American history after slavery
“These tests at their best allow new forms of connection that might not have been otherwise possible,” says Alondra Nelson, ...
Oldest known North American human remains–13,000 years old–found in underwater cave
An ice-free corridor between the Americas and Asia opened up about 12,500 years ago, allowing humans to cross over the ...
From horses to mice, animal inbreeding has shaped human existence
Humans have been breeding animals together, a new natural selection, since the beginning of time. However, inbreeding can have drastically ...
Podcast: How agriculture spurred the domestication of wild cats
Geneticist Eva-Maria Geigl: Early grain farms attracted rodents—and wild cats that were social enough to hunt them near human settlements ...
Peter Thiel’s quest for immortality: Escaping death would create the highest form of inequality
Peter Thiel, tech-philanthropist and billionaire, surmised that “probably the most extreme form of inequality is between people who are alive ...
Did life originate ‘naturally’ or are we a cosmic mistake?
Understanding the origin of life is arguably one of the most compelling quests for humanity. This quest has inevitably moved ...
Unlocking the past: DNA ancestry tests rewrite family histories
A growing number of companies now offer DNA tests that promise to pinpoint a customer’s heritage and, with permission, to ...
Are women more emotional than men?
Are women in fact more emotionally expressive than men? New research by McDuff, Kodra, Kaliouby, & LaFrance suggests they are. And they aren’t. Women ...
Alzheimer’s shock: DNA ancestry tests often tell customers more than they want to know
People who use genetic tests to trace their ancestry only to discover that they are at risk of succumbing to ...
Bear love affair: Grizzly and polar–Interbreeding neighboring species played key role in evolution
In 2006, a hunter shot what he thought was a polar bear in the Northwest Territories of Canada. Closer examination, ...
Genetic testing lags for mental illness, forcing parents to seek answers online
Genetic counseling for potential mental illness in children should be just as responsive as counseling for "physical" disease. Right now, ...
How to argue evolution with creationists
Creationists and scientists have separate definitions for the word "theory." Getting caught up in arguments about the word's meaning is ...
How, why and when humans became able to talk
How and when did we first become able to speak? A new analysis of our DNA reveals key evolutionary changes ...
Is sugar as addictive as hard drugs? Scientists say that’s ‘absurd’
An article suggesting that sugar should be considered an addictive substance, and could even be on a par with abusive ...
Cheese and dairy consumption changed the shape of our jaws
Humans have small, slender heads and weaker jaws, because of our discovery of soft foods like cheese and dairy, a ...
Findings and techniques of anthropologists and geneticists starting to converge
If anthropology and genetics seem distant from each other on the scientific spectrum, Connie Mulligan—a professor of anthropology at the ...
‘Genome cloaking’ and the quest to keep DNA test results private
Stanford University researchers have developed a tool to keep individual genetic information private, reducing the risk of discrimination by employers ...
