Human Spotlight
Viewpoint: We need constraints on artificial intelligence
If there’s nothing magical about our brains or essential about the carbon atoms that make them up, then we can ...
Saving the Galapagos: Gene drives could help rid invasive pests
Eradicating invasive species can be a brutal job. On the island of Floreana, a plan to eliminate the rodents that ...
World Anti-Doping Agency says ‘no’ to gene editing in sports competitions
The battle between sports cheats and testers is poised to enter a whole new arena. The World Anti-Doping Agency has ...
Measuring intelligence and IQ, and the problems that presents
For more than a century, IQ tests have been used to measure IQ. But their use is hotly debated by ...
A gene-editing first: Scientists try to edit a living human’s DNA
Scientists for the first time have tried editing a gene inside the body in a bold attempt to permanently change ...
Asteroid that killed dinosaurs had only 1-in-10 chance of causing extinction
The smack of the asteroid against Earth released energy on the order of billions of atomic bombs. Dinosaurs were the cataclysm's most famous ...
Viewpoint: Consumers with risky genes shouldn’t be penalized by insurers
[P]eople who have genetic tests run the risk of being denied some insurance if the test turns out positive. Such ...
Dog genome project: How your breed originated
From the 80-kilogram Great Dane to the 1-kilogram tiny teacup poodle, there seems to be a dog for everyone. Now, ...
DNA profiles of 500,000 people put online by UK Biobank in massive research effort
U.K. Biobank [recruited] 500,000 volunteers for a massive study on the origins of disease. In addition to collecting blood and urine, ...
Fighting antibiotic ‘superbugs’—DNA sequencing helps in the battle
The successful effort to contain an outbreak of the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) at a UK hospital demonstrates the ...
Personalized health care? Precision medicine finally coming of age
Precision medicine means that doctors will use patients’ medical histories, genetic information and relevant research to create a treatment plan ...
How genes affect children’s unique views of the world
A new study co-led by Indiana University that tracked the eye movement of twins finds that genetics plays a strong ...
Rodent-like creature may be our earliest ancestor
The earliest known ancestors of the mammal lineage that includes everything from humans, to blue whales, to pygmy shrews may ...
Ethical debates swirl around gene-editing decisions
[Editor's note: Joselin Linder is the author of the book "The Family Gene: A Mission to Turn My Deadly Inheritance ...
Lung cancer progression linked to enzyme that promotes epigenetic changes
In a study published in Nature Communications, researchers from Nanjing University in China have identified an enzyme that promotes lung ...
Could ‘superantibiotics’ save us from rising drug resistance?
The need for new classes of antibiotics has repeatedly been emphasised, with researchers turning to some of the most extreme environments on ...
Viewpoint: There’s no reason to panic over human germline editing
[Editor's note: Hank Greely is a professor of law and genetics at Stanford University.] Controversy has raged about editing human ...
Brain autopsy of murderer Aaron Hernandez shows severe CTE damage
For the first time since announcing former NFL star Aaron Hernandez's CTE diagnosis in September, Boston University neuropathologist Dr. Ann ...
US government pushes precision medicine research with Fitbit giveaway
In his 2015 State of the Union, President Obama announced the Precision Medicine Initiative — a massive research project designed ...
New error-free DNA sequencing method could diagnose rare diseases
A virtually error-free new method of DNA sequencing could one day be used to diagnose extremely rare cancers and hereditary ...
Challenging the RNA origin of life theory
The current consensus holds that life emerged from an ‘RNA-world’, first named by Nobel Laureate Walter Gilbert in 1986. This ...
FDA lightens up on ‘outrageous’ direct-to-consumer genetic information ban
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) head Scott Gottlieb is reeling in his agency's outrageous four-year ban on direct-to-consumer genetic testing. Under the ...
The quest to make CRISPR gene editing as easy as a smartphone app
[Biohacker Josiah Zayner] lives and works in Oakland, California, where he's converted a house into a scientific lab. Here, he ...
Oldest known human fossils rewrite Homo sapiens history
Hundreds of thousands of years ago, around 62 miles west of what would eventually become Marrakesh, a group of people ...
Naming genetic diseases: There’s more to it than you might think
An effort is underway to streamline the way we name genetic diseases, with an emphasis on imparting useful medical information, ...
Getting behind the genetics of high-altitude adjustments
People who both travel to and live at high altitudes typically cope with lower oxygen levels by increasing red blood ...
Gut microbiome could influence response to cancer treatment
When [cancer] drugs work, the immune system tramples tumors into oblivion. But they don’t always work—in fact, cancer drugs can ...
