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.
Can scientists derive a cure for Ebola from blood of survivors?
A group of scientists including three Nobel laureates in medicine has proposed that U.S. health officials chart a new path ...
Dangers of over-diagnosing a disease
Historically, the science of epidemiology was directed toward identifying and controlling epidemics of infectious disease. In a study just published ...
UK Parliament votes to ban abortion on basis of sex
MPs have voted overwhelmingly in favour of a motion declaring that sex-selection abortion is illegal. They voted 181 to 1 ...
How much does the public actually care about brain science?
It feels to me like interest in the brain has exploded. I’ve seen huge investments in brain science by the ...
For brain damaged man, smartphone is prosthetic memory device
You wouldn't guess from having a face-to-face conversation with Dixon that his brain is damaged. That's because nothing about his ...
Should you get a mastectomy when a BRCA mutation is detected?
Before I was scheduled for a double mastectomy at the age of 60, I knew I was infinitely blessed: The ...
Mothers’ breast milk transfers important signals to baby
Milk is not just food. The more closely scientists examine it, the more complexity they find. Along with nutrients like ...
Google developing nanotechnology to detect cancer
Last week, U.S. tech giants Google made a splash in the media, announcing plans to develop new ‘disease-detecting magnetic nanoparticles’ ...
Little-known microbe may profoundly effect our guts
The twisting helices of DNA within our bodies influence everything from our height to our personality to risk of diseases ...
Evolutionary origins of genitalia unveiled
When the first animals scrambled out of the water to live on land, they needed limbs and lungs. And something ...
Stem cell therapy may be effective treatment for Parkinson’s disease
Stem cells can be used to heal the damage in the brain caused by Parkinson's disease, according to scientists in ...
Rationalizing health risks difficult, especially when emotions in play
From Ebola to breast cancer screenings, people have a difficult time understanding where their health risks truly lie. Our emotional ...
Are Fluffy and Fido key to anti-aging research?
Dogs may join yeast and mice as candidates for large scale studies investigating drugs that may one day solve age-related ...
Snake species responsible for bite identified using DNA test
To treat victims of snakebites, it's important to know which type of snake did the biting. Now, a new test ...
What goes into the flu vaccine?
All flu vaccines start with flu viruses: genetic material packaged in an envelope of proteins and fats, studded with yet ...
Genes may aid in alcoholism recovery
There may be a new method to help those recovering from alcoholism. Scientists have discovered genetic markers that may help ...
Gene databases help in prescribing therapies to cancer patients
A major California university hospital is exploring ways to gather and use genetic information gathered from cancer patients, hoping to ...
Fossil unveils new mammalian lineage
Four years ago, while searching for fish fossils on Madagascar, paleontologists came upon what proved to be a well-preserved cranium ...
Pominent US biologist lectures UK Parliament: ‘Three-parent’ IVF too uncertain to be safe
This open letter was written by Paul Knoepfler, associate professor in the Department of Cell Biology and Human Anatomy, the Genome ...
Two Ebola vaccines currently being tested for future use
Two experimental vaccines against Ebola are currently being tested to see whether they are safe to use in people, and ...
Courtroom to test next generation DNA analysis
When DNA evidence began appearing in U.S. courtrooms in the late 1980s, it was heralded as the greatest leap forward ...
Getting older isn’t always bad for brains
For years, conventional wisdom held that growing older tends to be bad news for brains. Past behavioral data largely pointed ...
How many scents can a person smell? 10 to one trillion
Earlier this year, a paper in Science attempted to answer the question: how many smells can we actually smell? At ...
Ethics issue aside, freezing human eggs may be dangerous
When news broke several weeks ago that tech giants Apple and Facebook were offering female employees elective egg freezing benefits, ...
Low oxygen on Earth delayed evolution of early animal life
Animals were slow to evolve on Earth. While the first life forms emerged about a billion and a half years ago, ...
Stem cells in breast milk might persist throughout life
Breast milk may provide longer-term benefits than previously thought, extending even into adulthood. A study at the University of Western Australia found ...
Telomerator tool paves way for “designer” medicines, nutrients and biofuels
A new synthetic biology tool called "the telomerator" could boost the engineering of an organism's genetic, chemical base-pair structure ...
