The investigation of the genetics of behavior is a huge scientific enterprise, with great progress being made in a variety of species — roundworms, fruit flies, lab mice, sticklebacks. Dr. Hoekstra’s work is unusual in that it deals with a naturally occurring, complicated behavior in mammals that is important for survival. And it is significant that she has been able…
Humans engage in a lot of complex behaviors, but many of them are learned. Genetics gives us a nervous system that’s flexible enough to incorporate new behaviors, and we pick them up socially. But many animals display highly complex behavior that appears to be instinctual. Which raises the question of how these sorts of behaviors can be programmed into the…
According to University of California in Irvine scientist, Robert Moyzis, and his collegues, a variant of the dopamine-receptor gene may be associated with longevity. Their findings, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, show that the genetic variant called the dopamine receptor 4 (DRD4) 7-repeat allele, or DRD4 7R allele for short, appears in significantly higher rates in people more than 90 years old. Sci-News covers…
“Advances in understanding the human genome are having a dramatic impact on almost every area of medicine. Foundation Medicine’s approach in harnessing the power of genomic data to improve care for cancer patients could represent an extremely important step forward in improving routine cancer care. I’m happy to be supporting this quite promising approach.” With those words in a press…
A reporter from the MIT Technology Review discusses her experience of consumer genetics company 23andme, and reviews the future relationship between consumer genetics and the health industry. An excerpt follows, please click here for the full article. “For now, the biggest problem with consumer-friendly genetic products is simply that they may be medically inconclusive for most people. Indeed, I was…
A research team, led by the Institute of Zoology of Chinese Academy of Sciences and BGI Shenzhen presented the most complete reconstruction of the giant panda’s genetic history to date in the journal Nature Genetics. The whole genome resequencing of 34 wild giant pandas produced genetic evidence of the previous resistance of panda ancestors to climate variations and indicates that human encroachment and genetic adaptation have played the majority…