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.
Big Balls Theory: Testicles drive genetic evolution
Large testicles drive genetic evolution, with animals with larger testis having an increased speed of genome evolution, researchers have found ...
What’s so scary about the genetics of IQ?
If there is one subject that people like to talk about, it’s intelligence. This goes doubly if one’s child is ...
Gene mapping could save some African game animals
The lesson we can learn from the rebound of American bison might help a whole passel of African animals whose ...
30,000 year-old virus revived
As a general rule-of-thumb, eukaryotic cells (e.g., amoebae or human body cells) are about 1,000 times bigger than bacteria, and ...
Korean scientist’s new project: rebuild after cloning disgrace
No one galvanized South Korea’s national pride as he did, and no scandal in recent years unsettled the country as ...
Finding a treatment for binge eating, with rats and frosting
Two strains of rats, cans of vanilla frosting and a theory have helped MSU professor of psychology Kelly Klump take ...
Was Lamarck right? Epigenetic research suggests we might inherit learned traits. But how?
It seems almost certain that epigenetic effects -- an annotation to DNA that changes how genes are expressed -- can ...
Superfemale mice have secret male DNA
Even by mouse standards, the African pygmy mouse is tiny. It weighs just 5 grams, and is little more than ...
Genetics, digital revolution driving pharmaceutical renaissance
Modern molecular biology and genomics were supposed to lead to a targeted approach to drug development, but in fact our ...
Genetic entrepreneur J. Craig Venter to tackle the problem of human aging
Craig Venter sequenced the first human genome. He made the first synthetic cell. And now, for his next trick, he's ...
It’s time to start encrypting our genomes
The next time your privacy is invaded might not involve text messages, web browsing histories, or hidden cameras—it could involve ...
Parents best suited to make decisions on genetic testing for their families
Technology often outpaces ethical discussions; this has become evident in the current recommendations around next-generation genomic testing and the way ...
Capturing a snapshot of how cells interact
Scientists can now take snapshots of where and how thousands of genes are expressed in intact tissue samples, ranging from ...
Push to predict how next year’s flu will evolve
Influenza viruses evolve rapidly, making it hard to develop protective vaccines against them. Despite a great deal of effort, scientists ...
Why it’s not “Rain Woman”
Autism is a strange condition. Sometimes its symptoms of “social blindness” (an inability to read or comprehend the emotions of ...
Rare mutation kills off diabetes gene
A new study based on genetic testing of 150,000 people has found a rare mutation that protects even fat people ...
Shorter people less likely to have high IQs
Shorter people are likely to be less intelligent than taller people, according to scientists. Scientists in London and Edinburgh claim ...
Powerful new DNA-editing method
In the late 1980s, scientists at Osaka University in Japan noticed unusual repeated DNA sequences next to a gene they ...
China cracks down on DNA testing
Genetic testing has grown to be a business big enough in China to warrant the government’s intervention. Early in February, ...
Mature cells are flexible, able to change type
In 1998, University of Bath biologist David Tosh had a eureka moment. He noticed that some of the rat pancreatic ...
Largest-ever virus discovered in (and revived from) 30,000-year-old permafrost
A record-setting little giant---the biggest virus ever discovered---has been revived from 30,000-year-old Siberian permafrost with little more than a thaw ...
Chromosomal fusion shows when you, me, and the Neanderthals evolutionarily split from great apes
Orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, and bonobos have 24 chromosome pairs. But humans and our closest extinct ancestors have 23 as a ...
Artisanal salami…made with the meat of cloned celebrities?
"BiteLabs grows meat from celebrity tissue samples and uses it to make artisanal salami." So proclaims the copy on BiteLabs.org, ...
Sequencing the DNA in bird’s guts to see what draws them to airports
Usually they leave no more than blood smears; sometimes, busted engines and pulpy, feathery messes. Bird strikes, which occur when ...
Measuring genetic distance is harder than you’d think
You've probably heard or read that most genetic variation is within, not between races. This assertion has led, in my ...
Without accurate genome sequencing, personalized medicine is a goner
It's hard to correctly read every one of the six-billion base pairs in a human genome. But without precision sequencing, ...
Horshoe crabs bleed for biomedicine
The bright blue blood of horseshoe crabs is a biomedical treasure, but harvesting the blood of these unique creatures seems ...
