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.
COVID might be amplifying teenage suicide rates. Here’s how to help
Even during normal times, many mental health problems tend to emerge in adolescence, and young people in this group are ...
Video: Developing embryos show an immune response
Incredible new research has shown that long before the development of organs or specialized immune cells, this simple protective layer, ...
4.5 million Americans affected: Peanut allergies often don’t develop until adulthood, study shows
[A] report, believed to be the first to provide an estimate of peanut allergy in adults, suggests that at least ...
Exploring the boundary between consciousness and slumber
What was once seen as the neurological equivalent of annoying television static may have profound implications for how scientists study ...
Life on Earth originated on Mars? Here’s the intriguing case
Though the idea that life started on Mars before migrating on Earth sounds like some far-fetched sci-fi premise, many renowned ...
Hidden biological link: Could estrogen during pregnancy hold key to preventing autism?
Over the past decade, genomic analyses of humans... have identified gene mutations strongly associated with [autism spectrum disorders, or] ASDs, ...
Viewpoint: Toxic masculinity vs. toxic femininity — An evolutionary view
History bears testimony to the danger of demonising groups of people based on their immutable characteristics. Not only did this ...
Could ‘living DNA hard drives’ solve the coming data storage crisis?
Scientists working with CRISPR technology have made advancements in encoding data inside the DNA of bacteria, essentially creating “living hard ...
How years of ‘prolonged immaturity’ as babies provide humans with an evolutionary advantage
[H]uman babies, as well as the young of many other species of mammals and birds, require months or years of ...
China bets big on precision medicine, leading the world
Precision medicine — using genetic information to determine treatments — enables healthcare to move away from a one-size-fits-all approach where ...
Wearable sweat sensor reliably monitors illegal drug use, combatting athletic doping
Traditional drug detection process requires a complex method of extracting suspected drug components from biologic specimens including hair, blood, and ...
Why cooperation based on reciprocity is unique to humans
It has long been known that human cooperation is so successful in large part because of our reciprocity. We help ...
Is art an evolutionary adaptation?
In his book The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature, [evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey] Miller expands ...
Believing that aliens have visited our solar system is not just for kooks
The prolific Harvard University astrophysicist [Avi Loeb] has produced pioneering and provocative research on black holes, gamma-ray bursts, the early ...
Here’s how biotechnology is offering new hope for personalized cancer treatments
Cancer occurs when mutations, or accidental changes, take place in the DNA of specific cells or tissue within the body ...
Birds of play? How social engagement plays a role in brain development in birds, and maybe humans
Have you ever seen magpies play-fighting with one another, or rolling around in high spirits? Or an apostlebird running at full speed with a ...
Newly identified chimp pathogen found to be 100% fatal. Could it jump to humans?
[A deadly disease killing chimpanzees in a Sierra Leone sanctuary is] caused by a newly discovered species of bacterium and ...
Full face and hand transplants give badly burned man ‘new chance at life’
Almost six months after a rare face and hands transplant, Joe DiMeo is relearning how to smile, blink, pinch and ...
AI writing test accurately predicts Alzhiemer’s years before symptoms appear
People with a wide variety of neurological illnesses have distinctive language patterns that, investigators suspect, may serve as early warning ...
CRISPR ‘mini-brains’ made from Neanderthal DNA offer insight into the evolution of human cognition
Humans are more closely related to Neanderthals and Denisovans than to any living primate, and some 40% of the Neanderthal ...
It has an effect, period: How menstrual cycles influence mood
A research team led by Emma Pierson from Stanford University and Microsoft Research New England, US, found that the menstrual ...
Womb temperature determines the sex of the offspring in many reptiles. Why not in humans?
Temperature controls sex determination, in all crocodilians, most turtles, many fish, and some lizards, according to organismal biologist Karla Moeller ...
Video infographic: Extraordinary 3-D view inside a cancer cell
Even something as tiny as a cell is thick enough for specialized cameras to examine in detail. In a process ...
How low meat diets change your body and may help you live healthier and longer
High-protein diets are having a moment. In any grocery store you can now buy a protein bowl, pick up a ...
We were never alone: How many human species have existed?
When it comes to figuring out exactly how many distinct species of humans existed, it gets complicated pretty quickly, especially ...
Morbid curiosity? This study records what some people’s last moments alive were like
There’s no shortage of morbid curiosity surrounding death. But according to the researchers behind this project, known as the Death ...
In a blink of an evolutionary eye, this African island developed resistance to malaria. Here’s how
[R]esearchers have uncovered recent traces of adaptation to malaria in the DNA of people from Cabo Verde, an island nation ...
