Science Controversies
CRISPR poised to lead a revolution in managing crop diseases and pests
Plant diseases alone cause around 40% of global crop losses, and their emergence and re-emergence have always remained an alarming ...
Artificial intelligence (AI) can catch difficult-to-detect cancers in dense breasts–leading to better outcomes
MRI scans provide more detailed images than conventional mammography. At the same time, it takes a lot of time for ...
Even before COVID, 25% of parents were hesitant to vaccinate their young children and only 44% had them fully vaxxed
Data from a survey representing more than 7,500 parents showed that about one-quarter were hesitant to get their child vaccinated ...
CORBEVAX: Could this vaccine corral COVID in the developing world?
A vaccine authorized in December for use in India may help solve one of the most vexing problems in global ...
Viewpoint: Shutting down schools during COVID? Democrats over-reached and screwed up their COVID response
I can’t imagine that I would have arrived here—not a Republican, but questioning my place in the Democratic Party—had my ...
Here’s why there are fewer and fewer breakthrough drugs
In the UK, the U.S., France, Germany, and elsewhere, we are seeing the first signs that, for complex reasons, life ...
Viewpoint: ‘Ireland and EU are falling behind in crop improvement because of outdated policies on gene editing’
The EU is falling behind in crop improvement because of its outdated policies on gene editing, say crop scientists. Japan, Canada, ...
‘I really want to piss off the unvaccinated’: Europe cracks down on vaccine hesitant, imposing stricter mandates while lessening Omicron restrictions
Rarely has a European leader spelled out the continent’s Covid-19 strategy as bluntly as French President Emmanuel Macron, who said ...
The mission to restore the American chestnut tree using biotechnology
For almost two decades, [Sara] Fitzsimmons has been working to revive the American chestnut (Castanea dentata), a foundational species that ...
I’ve gotten two COVID vaccines and a booster. Will I need a 4th shot?
With the push for eligible Americans to get COVID-19 booster shots amid the omicron surge, many people are wondering if ...
Gene drive ethics: When it comes to evaluating gene editing in nature, how deeply should the public be engaged?
Public deliberation is typically considered useful and appropriate for addressing policy problems that involve high levels of value conflict and ...
Viewpoint: How Bangladesh can use genetic engineering to improve food security
Bangladesh has declared self-sufficiency in food in 2013 with a population of 150 million and continued to maintain the status ...
China poised to aggressively embrace GMO seeds to boost domestic soybean production
China has proposed an overhaul of regulations governing GM crops, in a move that is likely to strengthen the nation’s seed ...
Racial differences in medicine: Radiotherapy prostate treatment success in Black Americans linked to population-based genetic differences
Black men with localized prostate cancer had better treatment- and disease-specific outcomes than white men when treated with definitive radiotherapy, ...
China regards US search for COVID origins with suspicion — hobbling future pandemic preparedness
One fallout from the conflict over the origin of the pandemic is less scientific collaboration and more mistrust between two ...
Viewpoint: Success of home COVID tests should encourage FDA to open regulatory door to more at-home diagnostics
The response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the US has been transformed through new technologies. The speed of progress in ...
Ethics and bioscience: Stem cell-based embryo research could help dramatically reduce birth defects
According to multiple studies, one in three pregnancies results in miscarriage, and one in 33 babies that are born will ...
‘Bleeding, blood clots, inflammation, oxygen deprivation and disruption of the protective blood-brain barrier’: For a sizable percentage of hospitalized COVID patients, the coronavirus targets the brain
The current catalog of COVID-related threats to the brain includes bleeding, blood clots, inflammation, oxygen deprivation and disruption of the ...
Viewpoint: Many white evangelicals invoke bogus ‘Christian beliefs’ to justify vaccine resistance
In the grab bag of reasons for vaccine resistance, the religious exemption claimed by evangelicals is perhaps the most perplexing ...
‘Mission to find the perfect tomato’: Gene editing brings us antioxidant-rich, high-yielding varieties
The bushy tangle of elongated leaves and small red fruits were characteristic of a wild species of tomato plant native ...
When can we declare the COVID pandemic officially over?
Pandemics do eventually end, even if omicron is complicating the question of when this one will. But it won’t be ...
Major anti-vaccine misinformation disseminators: Pregnancy apps
For generations of parents, Heidi Murkoff’s 1984 pregnancy guide “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” has been a trusty companion, ...
How can you tell that a plant has been gene edited? Use this CRISPR sensor
CRISPR technologies have quickly become the primary tools of bioengineering, and new versions are continually in development. Identifying whether an ...
Omicron is dominating Delta, but future variants will most likely overtake them both
“Omicron is likely to push Delta out,” said Alex Sigal, a virologist at the Africa Health Research Institute in Durban, ...
46,000 people and counting: How COVID has impacted the study of human behavior
During the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jay Van Bavel, a psychologist at New York University, wanted to identify ...
Omicron symptoms similar to seasonal cold and flu
With the omicron variant now the dominant strain in the United States infecting the unvaccinated and fully inoculated alike, health ...
What’s the risk of COVID transmission among vaccinated people?
Once infected, vaccinated people seem to transmit COVID similarly to unvaccinated people; there’s no reason to suspect the same isn’t ...
