Health & Medicine
Through the study and use of genetics, we can identify measures that could lead to the improvement of human health and wellness. These methods and procedures aim to prevent years of chronic disease and thousands of dollars in health care costs, and provide families and communities with knowledge of how to live healthier.
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Participate or pay: Legislation would allow US employers to require genetic testing of workers
A little-noticed bill moving through Congress would allow companies to require employees to undergo genetic testing or risk paying a penalty ...
Seeing what others don’t: Do genius and madness walk hand-in-hand?
[Given the various so-called mad geniuses in history, many people assume] that creativity and psychopathology are intimately related...But some recent psychologists ...
When loud noises interrupt conversations, your brain fills in the blanks
Noise is everywhere, but that’s OK. Your brain can still keep track of a conversation in the face of revving ...
Canadian parliament approves genetic privacy bill, riles opponents
A vote in Canada’s Parliament to approve a genetic privacy bill is creating a self-inflicted political headache for Prime Minister ...
UN Commission report promoting organics, critical of pesticides challenged as biased
A recent UN report grabbed headlines for dismissing as ‘myth’ the notion that pesticides are necessary to feed the world ...
Autism risk linked to 18 new genes related to communication, socialization difficulties
Researchers have isolated 18 new genes believed to increase risk for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), a finding that may pave ...
8 ways farmers around the world are fighting drought
As farmers worldwide experience more frequent drought and erratic rainfall linked to climate change, the race to find and improve ...
Uganda launches field trial of GMO bananas resistant to wilting disease
This banana has been engineered to resist bacterial xanthomonas wilt (BXW). The gene that conferred resistance is from sweet pepper ...
Healthy eating: Why doesn’t US government spend more on specialty crop research?
As the country seeks solutions to the obesity epidemic, there’s been plenty of debate about how to get people to ...
Fact check: South African political party misleads about glyphosate’s cancer risk
Calling for a probe into “a possible crime against humanity”, a South African political party wants to halt the use ...
Too much knowledge? Should you sequence your baby’s genome?
Is there such a thing as having too much information about the health of your newborn? With the cost of ...
Fighting Zika: DNA vaccines may offer new weapon against virus
[In August 2016], scientists injected a [DNA] vaccine for Zika virus into a human being...Unlike some traditional methods, DNA vaccines ...
Buying organic food to avoid pesticides? You may want to reconsider
Do you seek out organic fruits and vegetables to avoid those on the Environmental Working Group’s Dirty Dozen list, fearful ...
Nigerian agriculture minister: Country has not officially embraced GMO crops but ‘we are watching’
Nigeria has not adopted Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) or genetic technology in agriculture and food production. Chief Audu Ogbeh, the ...
UK could become gene-editing leader in farming post-Brexit
Scientists at the Roslin Institute, near Edinburgh, said [February 2017] that they had edited the genomes of pigs, rendering them ...
Potential melanoma treatment uses protein that repairs damaged DNA
Scientists have discovered that the immune environment inside melanomas with mutations in the protein ATR...is altered in ways that promote ...
Insect-resistant GMO cowpeas could be available to Ghanaian farmers in 2018
Ongoing field tests on genetically modified cowpea (Bt cowpea) have produced successful results and will be ready for commercialisation and ...
Mike Adams, Alex Jones and Joe Mercola: How the web turns quacks into science gurus
Welcome to the vast universe of self-built social media empires devoted to spreading false, misleading, and polarizing science and health ...
Psychotherapy revival: Can “talk” therapy change our brains and genes?
"Talk therapy" has fallen out of fashion as being more art than science. But new research suggests that psychotherapy may ...
Oral cancer vaccine, with an assist from CRISPR, shows promise in treatment
Certain cancers seem to have a predilection for Asians...[A]ccording to the World Health Organization (WHO), oral cancer is responsible for ...
Sickle cell cure? Patient in complete remission following gene therapy
A number of recent headlines imply a recent case study just published...proves that gene therapy has cured sickle cell disease—a ...
Early warning: Alzheimer’s risk could be identified sooner through ‘jumping genes’
Duke University scientists have identified a mechanism in the molecular machinery of the cell that could help explain how neurons ...
GM crop successes in South Africa offer hope for continent wrestling with climate change
[Editor's note: Wandile Sihlobo is an agricultural economist and head of agribusiness research at the Agricultural Business Chamber (Agbiz) in ...
Organic 2.0: Biodynamic farming gains popularity in the US, but could it feed everyone?
National retailers like Whole Foods are stocking more biodynamic brands – but critics are questioning biodynamic farming’s ability to feed ...
‘Product versus process’ focus of GE crop regulation debate stalls biotech progress
[Editor's note: Jennifer Kuzma is a professor and co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center at North Carolina State University.] ...
Ignorance and the brain: Why people are so quick to believe falsehoods
How can so many people believe things that are demonstrably false? The question has taken on new urgency as the ...
Is transgender identity linked to genetics?
Sex is set, or “determined,” when an X chromosome from an egg finds itself in a nucleus with an X ...
