Genetics
- Genetics
Your DNA is an open book — but can’t yet be fully read
There are many companies that offer to read your DNA. But be prepared: They cannot yet fulfill all those promises you read in their ads.
- Animals
Living Mysteries: Meet Earth’s simplest animal
Trichoplax is the simplest animal on Earth. It has no mouth, stomach or brain. Yet it can teach how these and other organs evolved.
By Douglas Fox - Genetics
Scientists recruit bloodsucking leeches as research assistants
By analyzing a slimy, bloodsucking leech’s last meal, scientists can identify which animals had been living near it.
By Yao-Hua Law - Genetics
Explainer: DNA hunters
Snippets of DNA can be left behind by a passing organism. Some researchers now act as wildlife detectives to identify the sources of such cast-off DNA.
- Genetics
Can DNA editing save endangered species?
Scientists may be able to help endangered species by changing the genes of a whole population of wild animals. But some question whether that is wise.
- Plants
Increasingly, chocolate-makers turn to science
Chocolate is delicious and may even have health benefits. To make sure there’s enough to go around, scientists are growing heartier cacao trees.
- Agriculture
How to grow a cacao tree in a hurry
Chocolate is made from the pods of the cacao tree. To reproduce this plant quickly for research, scientists use clones.
- Health & Medicine
Janet’s chocolate mousse pie
The top two ingredients — dark chocolate and tofu — both have a reputation for being healthy. The good news for those who don’t like tofu: You can’t taste it in this pie. It just tastes like a very rich, thick chocolate mousse.
By Janet Raloff - Genetics
New tools can fix genes one letter at a time
New tools can edit the genome one letter at a time, correcting common errors that lead to disease.
- Life
Doctors repair skin of boy dying from ‘butterfly’ disease
Researchers fixed a genetic defect, then replaced about 80 percent of a child’s skin. This essentially cured the boy’s life-threatening disease.
- Genetics
Small genetic accident made Zika more dangerous
A new study finds that a tiny mutation made the Zika virus more dangerous, by helping it kill cells in the fetal brain.
- Genetics
Explainer: Why scientists sometimes ‘knock out’ genes
How do we learn what a particular molecule does in the body? To find out, scientists often 'knock out' the gene that makes it. Here’s how.