Daily Human Digest
Every day, the staff of the Genetic Literacy Project scours the Web for stories on a range of human genetics issues, including gene editing, regulations and bioethics, gene therapy, epigenetics, personal genomics, evolution, ancestry and artificial intelligence. We publish excerpts of those stories and encourage our readers to visit the original publications for the complete stories.
While no gene ‘causes’ mental illness, some genes make people more sensitive to environment
The same genes could make a person feel happy or depressed, depending on their environment. Combining research on genetics and ...
Synthetic biologists developing cells programmed to target, destroy cancer
Synthetic biology might be ready to graduate from cells engineered to perform only one task to multiple cells in a ...
Science communicators condemn Facebook’s censorship of pro-science “We Love GMOs and Vaccines”
Anti-GMO and anti-vaccine activists--many of them are the same--have manipulated Facebook to shut down a pro science site, stirring sharp ...
DNA testing can take you on the ride of your lifetime
Genealogy — thanks in part to genetic testing of companies like Ancestry.com, National Geographic and the PBS series “Finding Your ...
German institute deploys transgenics to fight harmful insects without toxins
South America is fighting a battle against tiger mosquitoes that transmit yellow fever, dengue fever and the Zika virus. In ...
Autism-gene connections deepen, undermining GMO and vaccine claims
A large proportion of autism research begins with and is centered upon external presentations of the disorder, primarily behavioral manifestations ...
Humans who can’t feel pain pointing way to non-addictive painkillers
Genes linked to pain detection and perception may be physiological targets for new, non-addictive painkillers ...
Is Alzheimer’s blood test too good to be true?
Anyone who has ever visited a doctor’s office is familiar with the use of blood tests for the diagnosis of ...
Human enhancement revolution: Science and ethics in precarious balance
Human enhancement is at least as old as human civilization. Up to this point in history, however, most biomedical interventions, ...
Great minds grow alike? Skulls of Neanderthals, modern humans show remarkable similarities
Evidence from Neanderthals’ skulls suggests that their large brains grew in the same way as ours do. That in turn ...
23andMe mobilizes its massive genome database to unravel depression clues
A scientific expedition into the DNA of more than 400,000 customers of gene-testing company 23andMe has uncovered the first major ...
Short bursts of brain activity during sleep may be key for memory consolidation
Sleep is essential for memory. Mounting evidence continues to support the notion that the nocturnal brain replays, stabilizes, reorganizes, and ...
Baby making moves from bedroom to the laboratory
The future of baby-making is not in a bed, or in the back seat of a car. It's in a ...
Problems emerge in US direct-to-consumer stem cell clinic market
Leigh Turner and Paul Knoepfler recently published an important paper in Cell Stem Cell on stem cell clinics in the US. Turner is a University of ...
Consumer beware: NIH database of cost-free-trials includes numerous ‘for a fee’ tests
The 16-year-old [ClinicalTrials.gov] website is the most comprehensive such database publicly available in the United States, with listings for nearly 220,000 ...
If a parent has Alzheimer’s, are her children destined to get it too?
The most common question I get asked is 'Will my child get Alzheimer's disease?' ... Those of us who are ...
Future of regenerative medicine may be making human tissue from fruits
In the high-ceilinged basement lab, the ear lies flat, encapsulated in a dish on a sheet-metal cabinet. It’s actually a ...
Genes major influence on academic achievement–and that makes leftists uncomfortable
A massive and fast growing field in science—behavioral genetics—has a huge body of conclusive evidence that, at first reading, seems at ...
Business booming for stem cell therapy clinics despite dearth of evidence of effectiveness
Out of nowhere, over the past two to three years, the clinics have sprung up — 570 in the United ...
Are Olympic athletes using ‘gene doping’ to improve performance?
The World Anti-Doping Agency, WADA, which advises the Olympics and other sports organizations on illicit performance-enhancement, has accused Russia of ...
Neuroscientists revisit horrific 1966 Texas tower massacre
Smart, strong, talented and popular, the young Charles Whitman seemed, outwardly, like a poster child for the “all-American boy” stereotype ...
Craig Venter’s goal is to sequence 100 million genomes
[Craig] Venter’s goal is to sequence at least one million genomes, something that seems likely to take the better part of ...
Belgian lab tapping genetics of yeast to brew better beer
Kevin Verstrepen’s lab meetings can be pretty boozy affairs. Twice a week, several members of his group at Belgium’s University ...
Bacteria that resides in our nose produces MRSA killing antibiotic
A new antibiotic that has, quite literally, emerged from the human nose. The compound is produced by one species of ...
Is egg freezing too expensive to help women who could benefit most from procedure?
In the US, the marketing of egg freezing as a kind of insurance policy for millennials is already in full ...
DNA analysis dubs residents of Yorkshire ‘most British’
The average Briton is only really 37 per cent British - with the remainder of their genes coming from European ...
GMOs in fight against Zika more than just about eliminating mosquitos
The shadow of the Zika virus hangs over the Rio Olympic Games, with visitors and even high-profile athletes citing worries ...
