Genetics & Molecular Biology

10 New Genes Related To Body Size Identified

An international study has discovered 10 new genes related to human growth. This meta-analysis, published in the latest issue of Nature Genetics, is based on data from more than 26,000 study participants. It verifies two already known genes, but also disco ...

Article - News Staff - May 10 2008 - 12:10am

GLUT2 Gene Linked To Sugary Food Consumption

A new study released today in the online edition of Physiological Genomics finds that individuals with a specific genetic variation consistently consume more sugary foods. The study offers the first evidence of the role that a variation in the GLUT2 gene – ...

Article - News Staff - May 13 2008 - 1:38am

Dutch Geneticists Sequence First Female DNA

In 2001, the DNA sequence was published of a combination of persons. The DNA sequences of Jim Watson, discoverer of the DNA’s double helix structure, followed in 2007, and later the DNA of gene hunter Craig Venter. Recently the completion of the sequences ...

Article - News Staff - May 27 2008 - 10:57am

Progress In The Hunt For Autism Genes

Much of the coverage of autism in the media focuses on the arguments of advocates, scientists, and government officials over the relationship between vaccines and autism. But out of the spotlight, a bigger story is brewing: the hunt for autism genes, a tec ...

Article - Michael White - Mar 31 2010 - 4:46pm

How To Date Your Fat Cells With Nuclear Bombs

Scientists have been trying to understand how and when we gain or lose fat cells, and now a paper in this week's issue of Nature reports that nuclear bombs are the key to solving this problem. To understand how our bodies regulate our weight, research ...

Article - Michael White - Jun 5 2008 - 9:35pm

Where Do Genes Come From?

In biology, everything has a history. Creationists love to try to calculate the probability of a new gene spontaneously coming into existence, but that's not how genes are born. New genes most often come from other genes: one gene gets duplicated by a ...

Article - Michael White - Jun 12 2008 - 10:49am

Dog DNA- Locations Discovered For Skull Shape, Body Type And Even Trainability

What makes a pointer point, a sheep dog herd, and a retriever retrieve? Why do Yorkshire terriers live longer than Great Danes? And how can a tiny Chihuahua possibly be related to a Great Dane? Dogs vary in size, shape, color, coat length and behavior more ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 21 2008 - 11:44pm

Tomatoes- Old Fashioned Genetic Modification

In general, domesticated food plants have larger fruits, heads of grain, tubers, etc, because this is one of the characteristics that early hunter-gatherers chose when foraging for food and later planting it. Domesticated tomatoes can be up to 1000 times l ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 27 2008 - 11:33pm

Genomic Imprinting In Mammals 150 Million Years-Old, Says Study

Epigenetic mechanisms are at the heart of developmental biology, orchestrating the formation of many different tissues and organs from a fertilised egg. Almost all cells in an individual have exactly the same genetic material, yet behave very differently d ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 30 2008 - 11:40pm

Gecko Genome Size And Cell Size

One of the many aggravations I encounter when reviewing manuscripts is that some authors greatly overstate the applicability of statistically significant patterns they report. For example, a statistically significant pattern in a small comparison of a few ...

Article - T. Ryan Gregory - Jul 5 2008 - 1:48pm