Atlantic
Tracing Mormon ancestry may help uncover mysteries of colon and breast cancer
Nobody knew it then, but the genetic mutation came to Utah by wagon with the Hinman family. Lyman Hinman found ...
Diseases and behaviors likely the product of thousands of genes with complex interactions
If you told a modern geneticist that a complex trait...was the work of just 15 genes, they’d probably laugh. It’s ...
Does power corrupt? Leaders often lose ability to empathize linked to brain impairment
If power were a prescription drug, it would come with a long list of known side effects. It can intoxicate ...
Discovery of 315,000-year old human fossils may rewrite history of our ancestors
[B]ones of the former occupants [of a Moroccan cave called Jebel Irhoud] have been recently unearthed by an international team ...
Energized evolution: How Earth’s history has been shaped by energy discoveries
Humans bodies require a ridiculous and—for most of Earth’s history—improbable amount of energy to stay alive. Consider a human dropped ...
Glowing Plant’s failed Kickstarter venture highlights pitfalls of synthetic biology
The latest update came quietly on [in April 2017]. “We’re sorry to say that we have reached a significant transition ...
Hi-C: Quick genome sequencing cracked Zika mosquito genome, more advances likely
Ten years ago, a team of scientists published the first genome of Aedes aegypti—the infamous mosquito that spreads Zika, dengue ...
Genetics branding: CRISPR sounds like a breakfast bar and that may be confusing
[D]espite massive hype in the science and general press, [the gene-editing tool CRISPR] probably remains unfamiliar or misunderstood to many ...
Would loss of genetic privacy protection scare people away from research participation?
GINA—the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act—was written...[to prevent] employers from basing employment decisions on someone’s genes [and to stop] health insurers ...
Eczema-taming ointment could be made with bacteria from your own skin
Teruaki Nakatsuji and Richard Gallo from the University of California, San Diego, have discovered that some bacteria which naturally live ...
Booming market in novelty consumer DNA tests aimed at lifestyle, wellness and entertainment
Stephane Budel has an idea for an app: You get your DNA sequenced to find out which comic book superhero ...
Alzheimer’s linked gene may protect brain from parasites
People who carry one copy [of the ApoE4 gene] have a three-fold higher risk of Alzheimer’s than those with none...Even if ...
Do assumptions about race in genetics research promote the Alt-Right agenda?
[On the Internet, there are] pages after pages of Stormfront discussions on the reliability of 23andMe ancestry results and whether ...
Fertilizers helped food keep pace with population growth but with Faustian bargain?
Most people don’t think about fertilizer, but few innovations are as central to modern life. In the 20th century, manmade ...
Future of Alzheimer’s treatment? Flickering lights
[If neurons fire] 30 to 90 times [in a single second], that’s a gamma wave, which has been linked to ...
Your brain uses different regions to remember something clearly and vividly
In an elegant experiment, a team of neuroscientists led by Jon Simons at the University of Cambridge have shown that ...
Sources of inherited diseases may emerge with map of complex gene interactions
In yeast, only one in five genes is essential...however, if a pair of nonessential genes is removed—sometimes, death comes quickly ...
Chinese use CRISPR to breed hairier cashmere goats
In China, the world’s top producer of cashmere, scientists have been trying to breed more productive cashmere goats. They’ve now ...
Bipolar disorder’s biological basis, how lithium works as treatment
[O]ver the years, lithium has remained a standby treatment [for bipolar disorder]. “It’s still arguably one of the best medications,” ...
Genetic autopsies offer more questions than answers for grieving families
[S]equencing DNA has become orders of magnitude cheaper and more sophisticated. With medical examiners considering DNA tests as part of ...
Genes linked with schooling does not mean they affect education directly
[I]n a study of almost 294,000 people, an international team led by Daniel Benjamin, David Cesarini, and Philipp Koellinger has ...
What Mr. X’s struggles with hemispatial neglect reveals about human consciousness
When I was a graduate student 25 years ago, I met a man I’ll call Mr. X, who had recently ...
CRISPR opens door to new generation of more nutritious and delicious fruits and vegetables
A few weeks ago, Stefan Jansson, a Swedish plant biologist, sat down to a plate of pasta with cabbage harvested from his ...
Will evolution eventually undo effects on ecosystem of gene drives?
[A]t New York’s Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory[,] Philipp Messer...took the stage to discuss a powerful and controversial new application for genetic ...
Video: Scientists film bacteria evolving antibiotic resistance in real time
Ever since the invention of antibiotics, we have been fighting an escalating arms race against bacteria for several decades. Michael ...
Lichens formed through symbiosis among three organisms, not two
Lichens have an important place in biology. . . . they’re composite organisms, consisting of fungi that live in partnership ...
Piecing together how Lucy, world’s most famous fossil, perished
In 1974, scientists working in Ethiopia uncovered an extraordinary female skeleton, whom they called Lucy. She was 3.2 million years ...
Uses for DNA may spread to far-flung fields like archaeology and fine arts
In the past couple of decades, genetics has revolutionized fields such as...medicine. In the next couple, expect DNA to turn ...
