Human Features
The GLP tackles innovations in human genetics and biotechnology. We highlight the work of our own writers, as well as that of contributors from around the Web. The GLP does not take a position on genetics-related issues; any opinions expressed belong to the authors.
Categories include:
- CRISPR and gene editing
- Gene therapy
- Stem cell research
- Genetic diseases
- Synthetic biology
- Epigenetics
- Biodrugs (pharmacogenetics)
- Personal genomics
- Ancestry and evolution
- Ethics and regulations
Inching toward a global treaty on plastic pollution
Delegates from 175 nations are working on an international agreement that would tackle the vast amounts of plastic waste in ...
Viewpoint: Why environmental activists often block innovations that could help fight climate change?
Whether you know it or not, environmental activist groups are increasingly dictating how you live. They file costly lawsuits that ...
GLP podcast: Busting myths about seed oils; Can AI solve our loneliness epidemic? Idaho’s incendiary medical consent law for minors
Health influencers often declare that seed oils are driving an epidemic of non-communicable diseases. The science says otherwise. Can we ...
Rethinking the 10,000 year existential overlap of Neanderthals and modern humans
The idea that two different human species, Homo sapiens (us) and Neanderthals, coexisted in Western Eurasia 50,000–40,000 years ago has long captured ...
Viewpoint: Should doctors stop using ‘race’ when evaluating patients for treatment?
Embedded Bias: Doctors use problematic race-based algorithms to guide care every day. Why are they so hard to change? [Editors ...
AI is supercharging gene editing, slingshotting us into a future of creating new life
During her chemistry Nobel Prize lecture in 2018, Frances Arnold said, “Today we can for all practical purposes read, write and ...
GLP podcast: Psychedelics an overhyped depression cure? ‘Suicide pod’ used for the first time; Tuition-free medical school—blessing or curse?
A steady stream of studies and news stories has presented psychedelics as a game-changing therapy for depression. This may have ...
Viewpoint: The environmentalist case for Ecomodernism
The climate continues to change, driven now by human actions. As it does, the warnings grow more pressing, the heat ...
Decarbonization and meaningful climate mitigation is a long game
One of the long-standing tropes of climate politics in the United States is that as every presidential election comes into ...
Viewpoint: Hurricane-caused drug and IV fluid shortages expose a vulnerability in U.S. supply chains. Here’s a solution.
The recent storms that ravaged Florida and other states affected more than homes and infrastructure. Hurricane Helene inflicted significant damage ...
America’s abortion patients are traveling from state to state to navigate the changing patchwork of abortion restrictions
Soon after a series of state laws left a Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia, Missouri, unable to provide abortions in ...
Florida’s anti-vaccine surgeon general takes his disinformation campaign on the road with RFK, Jr., anti-vaxxers, and Nazi-promoting ‘health specialists’
Florida has much going for it, but the state’s public health system doesn’t make the list. The opprobrium is largely ...
How do we know when we need to pee? It’s surprisingly complex — and can go awry as we age
You’re driving somewhere, eyes on the road, when you start to feel a tingling sensation in your lower abdomen. That ...
Mental illness is an under-reported, post-infection consequence of COVID. Here’s what you can do to mitigate your risk.
Misguided COVID-minimizers like to say that COVID-19 is no worse than a cold that lasts a few days and then ...
With the Chevron Doctrine overturned, the new ‘judicial veto’ of regulations will be bad for science and business
A colleague and I wrote about recent Supreme Court decisions that produced sweeping changes in how government regulation works in the ...
How good is your sense of direction? Here’s why some people never get lost
Like many of the researchers who study how people find their way from place to place, David Uttal is a ...
Trump oversaw one of the great public health accomplishments of the century in the discovery of a Covid vaccine. Now he’s leading the campaign against it
More than four years ago, former President Donald Trump’s administration accelerated the development and rollout of the covid-19 vaccine. The ...
These people deliberately exposed themselves to COVID to figure out why some people are naturally immune. Here’s what we learned
Throughout the pandemic, one of the key questions on everyone’s mind was why some people avoided getting COVID, while others ...
Viewpoint: Placebo controversy — When should they ethically be used in studies?
The placebo effect is a phenomenon where individuals experience– or perceive to experience– improvements in symptoms or conditions after receiving a treatment ...
Sickle cell victim summits Killimanjaro after breakthrough gene therapy treatment
Jimi Olaghere was born with sickle cell anemia. He endured years of painful crises, fatigue, and breathing problems. This month, ...
GLP podcast: Should scientists endorse political candidates? Debate erupts over Scientific American’s support for Kamala Harris
"Vote for Kamala Harris to Support Science, Health and the Environment," Scientific American wrote in an incendiary September 16 editorial ...
The Spanish Flu killed 50 million people. It’s frightening that terrorists can create a synthetic version of the pathogen
“The Terrorism Warning Lights Are Blinking Red Again,” according to former CIA Deputy Director Mike Morell, who delivered that message ...
3.2-million-year-old Lucy may provide a lesson in the link between nudity and shame
Fifty years ago, scientists discovered a nearly complete fossilized skull and hundreds of pieces of bone of a 3.2-million-year-old female ...
Viewpoint: ‘It’s a shortsighted move that will inflame America’s disdain for science’: Scientific American breaks precedent, endorses Kamala Harris
This week, Scientific American urged readers to "Vote for Kamala Harris to Support Science, Health and the Environment." It's a ...
Viewpoint: More American Academy of Pediatrics missteps — Its questionable endorsement of allowing hormone blockers in children
The American Academy of Pediatrics warns that pesticides are endocrine-disrupting chemicals that harm children. Absurdly, AAP also endorses the use ...
The bigger the animal, the bigger its brain? Not so fast
Scientists have long believed that, generally speaking, the bigger an animal is, the bigger its brain. But our recent study challenges ...
130 lung cancer patients from six countries given experimental mRNA vaccine as study commences
The first jabs were recently administered in London. There, researchers are testing a vaccine designed to hunt down and kill ...
