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
Viewpoint: Race and sex: The danger of oversimplifying the spectrum of human differences
In 2021, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz compared critical race theory — an academic subfield that examines the role of racism in American institutions, laws, ...
With global temperatures rising, it’s time to take a fresh look at geoengineering. Is it feasible and affordable?
In July 2012, a renegade American businessman, Russ George, took a ship off the coast of British Columbia and dumped ...
Viewpoint: Tort lawyer and HHS Secretary RFK, Jr. falsely claim thimerosal—used safely in vaccines for 90 years—contains dangerous mercury
RFK Jr. released a video addressed to the Minamata Convention on Mercury where he lied about vaccines. Again. And again ...
Viewpoint: Do chemicals in common plastics really kill
Three hundred fifty thousand of you are predicted to die every year from heart disease caused by exposure to plastics, ...
GLP podcast: Obesity—Disease or Choice? Ozempic’s Triumph Reignites the Debate
US obesity rates are falling from a record high after steadily climbing since the 1960s, dropping to 37 percent this ...
Is Vitamin D the anti-aging pill we’ve been looking for?
Vitamin D supplements could help protect the caps on our chromosomes that slow ageing, sparking hopes the sunshine vitamin might ...
Viewpoint: RFK, Jr. and vaccines — here’s what a prominent physician says he gets dangerously wrong
In the months since he began serving as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy ...
Treating Huntington’s
During my neurology rotation as a medical student, one of my first patients was in the middle stage of much-dreaded ...
Happy 43rd birthday, GMO insulin. FDA approval in 1982 took 5 months. How many years would it take now?
This is the 43rd anniversary of one of biotechnology’s most significant milestones — the approval by the Food and Drug ...
GLP podcast: ‘Health freedom’—a human right or MAHA propaganda tool?
RFK, Jr.'s Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) coalition has built its platform on the concept of health freedom, a belief ...
Human differences: The concept of ‘race’ is infused with historical prejudice but ‘genetic populations’ are real. What’s the difference?
In the recent flurry of executive orders from President Donald Trump, one warned of “a distorted narrative” about race “driven ...
The science behind a restful night’s sleep
We’ve all experienced this: You’re in the middle of a lovely dream. Perhaps you’re flying. As you’re soaring through the ...
RFK, Jr.’s bungled science on thimerosal and vaccines
Mercury, the element, is no longer used in thermometers, but it remains at the center of a decades-long debate over ...
Viewpoint: Beyond Plastics: Here’s how ‘dark money’ funds activist environmental causes and keeps money flowing to tort lawyers
Tucked away in the quaint folds of Vermont’s Bennington College, a tiny liberal arts school with fewer students than a ...
The EU passes landmark legislation to curb plastic nurdles threatening ocean ecosystems. It’s not enough. Genetically engineered bacteria could help
Spain’s northern coast has been fighting a months-long assault from a ‘white tide’ of plastic pellets dumped by a Dutch-registered ship ...
GLP podcast: Are science journals corrupt? Dr. Kevin Folta examines the ‘replication crisis’
The science community faces an existential crisis as thousands of studies are retracted and dozens of peer-reviewed journals are forced ...
Viewpoint: How cancer cultists and health justice vigilantes politicize science
A paper by Cristian Tomasetti and Bert Vogelstein, published in 2015 in Science, found that two-thirds of cancers were caused by "bad ...
Viewpoint: Tylenol causes autism? Diet Coke brain tumors? Ice cream shark attacks? None of the claims is true—unless you’re an activist or a tort lawyer
Every week, the headlines blare a new health apocalypse: “Diet soda causes depression!” “Tylenol in pregnancy linked to autism!” “Pesticides ...
Beyond BMI: Is obesity a disease?
The Lancet Commission has declared obesity a disease. With enough controversy to fill a buffet table, their new definition is sparking ...
Consumer Reports is fearmongering (again). No, protein powders don’t contain ‘toxic’ levels of lead
Consumer Reports is at it again, this time, fear-mongering about lead in protein powders. Their latest headline and “report” concludes ...
GLP podcast: America’s overdose epidemic, explained
The story most people know about America's opioid epidemic, a public health crisis claiming over 1 million lives since 1999, ...
Viewpoint: ‘The rise in autism rates cannot solely be attributed to more accurate diagnoses’
The Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) recently presented startling figures on the increase in autism diagnoses from 2010 to ...
The next front in the U.S.–China trade war: Beijing’s control of life-saving medicines?
The U.S.–China trade conflict reignited this past week when Beijing announced it would expand export controls on rare earth minerals ...
Circumcision can lead to autism? RFK, Jr. and Trump again misinterpret studies, make false claims
We’ve been working on this article for weeks. Poring over studies on the Tylenol-autism topic. Just before we got it ...
Viewpoint: Why do some global cancer research agencies claim that using a cell phone (like drinking Diet Coke with aspartame) poses a cancer risk?
Although some people argue that cell phone usage contributes to rising brain cancer rates, analysis of the data shows no ...
Viewpoint: Reinforcing ideology: Right-wingers far more likely than liberals to source most news from like-minded social media
People on TikTok tend to follow accounts that align with their own political beliefs, meaning the platform is creating political ...
Public health without Washington: The growing backlash against Trump and RFK Jr.’s war on evidence-based medicine
The past few weeks have been bruising for public health. First, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., ...
