Friday, March 22, 2013 - 2:08pm
Do we really inherit the "bald" gene from our mother's side of the family? Learn the truth, and then resign yourself to the inevitable.
Genetics stories
Thursday, December 20, 2012 - 1:03pm
Whether we call it the fountain of youth, or just a beauty potion, humanity has long been on the hunt for a magic elixir to ward off the effects of aging. Now a research team in China has reportedly come up with what they believe could in fact be a real anti-aging formula.
Friday, December 14, 2012 - 4:39pm
Whether it's a local politician claiming Native American ancestry or your hipster friend asserting some vague familial connection to French aristocracy, thanks to advances in science it's becoming increasingly difficult to obscure one's true ancestry.
Friday, December 14, 2012 - 1:52pm
If dressing your Christmas tree and stringing all of those lights has become a bit tedious, scientists in England want to end that ritual by developing a self-glowing Christmas tree using genes spliced from jellyfish and fireflies.
Thursday, December 6, 2012 - 5:27pm
A growing body of evidence is suggesting that genetics has a subtle but measurable influence on our political views. While our genes can't fill out our ballots for us, the relative position of a person on a liberal to conservative scale may be somewhat predictable through genes. This is called genopolitics.
Monday, November 5, 2012 - 3:01pm
Having a genetic disease means that there's something wrong with your DNA. Somewhere, in those millions of base pairs, even the simplest mutation (or mis-coding) in a gene can cause all sorts of serious problems, and since the problem is at such a basic level, it's impossible to fix without rewriting the essence of what makes you you. And we can now do that.
Friday, September 14, 2012 - 12:28pm
It might be time to get Gattaca-level paranoid about leaving your DNA all over the place, as geneticists are getting closer to being able to determine what your face looks like simply by analyzing your genetic code.
Friday, July 20, 2012 - 1:54pm
These blobs are Mycoplasma genitalium, a bacterial parasite which lives in your naughty bits and makes it burn when you pee. Scientists at Stanford and the J. Craig Venter Institute have honored this monster by making it the first complete organism to have its entire genome modeled inside a computer program.
Thursday, May 31, 2012 - 3:59pm
Rayfish Footwear is a company from Thailand that claims to be able to genetically engineer stingrays with customized colors and patterns that it then uses to make shoes. It's a futuristic, dramatic, and perhaps ethically questionable way of designing clothing— we're just not quite sure whether it's real or not.
Thursday, December 8, 2011 - 3:57pm
You know those eyes in the back of you're head you've always wanted? Geneticists have now figured out how to get tadpole embryos to grow any organ, anywhere in their bodies.
