All Stories by Tina Hesman Saey
- Life
How a moth went to the dark side
Peppered moths and some butterflies are icons of evolution. Now scientists have found a gene responsible for making them so.
- Animals
The turning of wolves into dogs may have occurred twice
The process of turning wolves into dogs, called domestication, may have occurred twice — in the East and the West — ancient DNA suggest.
- Brain
A ‘cocktail’ in the brain can trigger sleep
A new study finds that a ‘cocktail’ of chemicals in the brain can directly cause mice to fall asleep or waken.
- Genetics
Genes: How few needed for life?
Scientists rebuilt a microbe using its old genes. But not all of them. They used as few building-blocks as they could get away with and still have the life-form survive.
- Fossils
Neandertal toe contains human DNA
DNA from a 50,000-year-old Neandertal woman’s toe bone shows humans left a mark on the ancient species — and much earlier than scientists had thought.
- Life
Cell recount: People host far fewer germs
Since the 1970s, microbiologists have been saying bacteria outnumber human cells in our bodies by about 10-to-1. A new analysis says that old number was a “fake” fact — and gross exaggeration.
- Animals
Gene editing swats at mosquitoes
A new genetic technique can render insects that spread malaria unable to reproduce.
- Science & Society
Expert panel approves human gene editing
Scientists have recently been reporting big advances in the ability to tweak the genes of living organisms, including people. But some question the ethics of doing that. A panel of experts now says such research can go ahead — with one major exception.
- Genetics
Gene editing creates buff beagles
Scientists showed that a potentially useful new gene-editing tool can work in dogs. It created a pair of adorable, muscular puppies. But the goal is to use it for other research purposes.
- Health & Medicine
If you’re awake, you’re probably eating
The idea that we eat three meals a day is a myth. People eat nearly constantly, and that may not be good for our health.
- Health & Medicine
Nobel goes for developing drugs from nature
The 2015 Nobel Prize in medicine went to scientists who used nature as the model for important human drugs to combat malaria and serious infections.
- Health & Medicine
New treatments may rally ex-president’s fight against cancer
Former President Jimmy Carter has a potentially lethal type of skin cancer that has already spread to his liver and brain. Recent improvements in medicine may help him fight it.
