Genetics & Molecular Biology

Steve over as Quintessence of Dust has prepared an excellent edition of Mendel's Garden. Read about how to know when you're being overcharged for personalized genetic testing, how to tell whether…

An international team of researchers  has uncovered the first gene linked to the most common type of epilepsy, called Rolandic epilepsy. One out of every five children with epilepsy is diagnosed…

Via Pharyngula, some non-scientist MD thinks that ~21,000 protein-coding genes aren't nearly enough to make a human (which of course then means that evolution is wrong): 4) The Human Genome Project…

Can't help being the life of the party?   Us either.   Maybe we were just born that way. Researchers from Harvard University and the University of California, San Diego have found that our…

Genes that contain instructions for making proteins make up less than 2% of the human genome. Yet, for unknown reasons, most of our genome is transcribed into RNA.  Investigating all transcripts…

Ever since the time of Mendel, students and the general public have struggled with how to understand the interconnection of mathematics and genetics. Not because understanding Mendelian mathematics…

A research team in Portugal and the US has found for the first time nicotine receptors in the taste buds. In fact, although most of the toxicity of smoking is linked to other components, it is…

Daniel at Genetic Future has posted the latest edition of Gene Genie. Go read about blog reactions to Steven Pinker's genome, a DNA database for Portuguese criminals, predictions on what super-power-…

Scientists who study how human chemistry can permanently turn off genes have typically focused on small islands of DNA believed to contain most of the chemical alterations involved in those switches…

Scientists at deCODE genetics have completed the largest study of ancient DNA from a single population ever undertaken. Analyzing mitochondrial DNA, which is passed from mother to offspring, from 68…