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.
Psychedelics are touted as a mental health cure. We should be wary
No psychiatric treatment has attracted quite as much cash and hype as psychedelics have in the past decade. Articles about ...
Biological resilience: How aging disrupts our ability to bounce back from stress
Feel like it takes longer to recover from everything these days—whether it’s an injury or poor sleep? That’s the reality of ...
No needles: At home no shot flu vaccine approved, should be available next year
The Food and Drug Administration has approved the first flu vaccine that people can administer to themselves at home. The ...
‘Suicide pod’ used for the first time to assist a woman in dying.
The world’s first assisted suicide pod wraps around the human body like a space capsule, tilting gently toward the sky ...
‘We will be able to bring our son back’: Indian couple wins the right to their dead son’s frozen semen
A couple in India have said they are "delighted" after a court ordered a hospital to hand over the frozen ...
Americans’ average lifespan now sits at 78 years. Will we continue to live longer?
The oldest human on record, Jeanne Calment of France, lived to the age of 122. What are the odds that ...
From edible microrobot teeth cleaners to regenerating your teeth with a drug, the future of dentistry is poised to change
Imagine a world where you could regenerate a missing tooth with a single drug, and microrobots clean your teeth every ...
No good deed goes unpunished: Exxon faces California state suit for recycling 20% of its plastic
The Center for Climate Integrity (CCI), which is funded by the Rockefeller Family Fund, published a report alleging that “Big Oil” deceived ...
Video: What is the science behind aphrodisiacs?
Aphrodisiacs are substances like foods or supplements believed to increase sexual desire and pleasure. While many believe in their effects, ...
Since the repeal of Roe v. Wade, strict state anti-abortion laws have led to the prosecution of hundreds of women for pregnancy-related crimes
In the year after the U.S. Supreme Court ended the nationwide right to abortion in its Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s ...
Scientific fraud kills people — but it’s not illegal. What should be done?
[O]ne of the cases was when a woman delivered a stillborn baby at her home about six or seven months ...
Miracle therapy or courting danger? Weight-loss drugs are being touted as a potential cure of dozens of disorders
Animal studies and analyses of electronic health records suggest that the latest wave of weight-loss drugs — known as glucagon-like ...
‘We’ve not found evidence that Neanderthals wore clothes
Braving the cold weather in Northern Europe required Neanderthals to have robust bodies and a facility for making fire. But did ...
Doctor’s say a single concussion could dramatically raise a person’s risk of developing Parkinson’s. Bret Favre estimates he had “thousands” of them
Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre’s announcement that he has Parkinson’s disease is bringing renewed attention to the potential links between ...
Fearful of a Republican rollback of Washington state’s reproductive rights, state stockpiles abortion pills
Washington state's first-in-the-nation stockpile of abortion drugs will serve as insurance against future lawsuits seeking to ban the procedure nationwide ...
Did Neanderthals go extinct or were they absorbed?
Ever since the first Neanderthal bones were discovered, people have wondered about these ancient hominins. How are they different from ...
Was Christopher Columbus Jewish? Geneticists battle over contentious claim
The documentary Columbus DNA His True Origin, broadcast on Spain’s National Holiday suggests that [Christopher Columbus] was not Genoese and ...
Viewpoint: Trump-RFK, Jr. commercial promotes bizarre, conspiracy-laden plan to ‘make America healthy’
In the first four minutes of a recent video for his “Make America Healthy Again” campaign promoting Donald Trump for ...
Video: Should we recognize AI robots as human? Here’s why it’s not so farfetched.
Artificial intelligence already exhibits many human characteristics. Given our history of denying rights to certain humans, we should recognize that ...
Are vaccines the future of cancer prevention?
Researchers are making progress toward vaccines that train healthy people’s immune systems to eliminate signs of cancer before it develops ...
Richard Dawkins’ reverie on the twists and turns of evolution is a ‘do not miss’ book
What, do you suppose, is the closest living relative of the hippopotamus? The rhinoceros, perhaps? The pig? In fact, it’s ...
‘The Japanese population isn’t as genetically homogenous as everyone thinks’
By studying the genomes of more than 3,000 people across Japan, researchers have shed light on the population’s complex ancestry ...
Science-based advice on how to talk to your dog to deepen your connection
Your pooch may already be your best friend, but changing the way you talk to them could make your bond ...
Were Neanderthals violent and territorial? That’s the stereotype but that better describes Homo sapiens
Throughout the 19th century, when the theory of evolution was struggling to land in the public imagination, discussions about Neanderthals were ...
‘Our planet is choking on plastics”—They are challenging to recycle, but what if we could vaporize them
Some of the worst [plastic] offenders, which can take decades to degrade in landfills, are polypropylene—which is used for things ...
How the brain predicts coming events
The human brain is constantly picking up patterns in everyday experiences — and can do so without conscious thought, finds ...
Viewpoint: Conspiracy thinking undergirds ‘woo woo’ alternative health advocates – and they could be in the next Trump administration
If Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were president, this is the kind of Cabinet he might appoint: Vani Hari, a.k.a. the ...
