Research has established that there are traces of Neandertal DNA in the genome of modern humans. Now an exploratory study that assessed the facial structure of prehistoric skulls is offering new insights, and supports the hypothesis that much of this interbreeding took place in the Near East – the region ranging from North Africa to Iraq. “Ancient DNA caused a ...

Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have developed transgenic mosquitoes that stably express the Cas9 enzyme in their germline. The addition of Cas9 will enable the use of the CRISPR gene editing tool to make efficient, targeted changes to the mosquitoes’ DNA. As proof of concept, the researchers used the system to disrupt cuticle, wing, and eye development, producing ...

Stanford University scientists have described a new type of test that can detect genetic mutations in minute amounts of DNA released from cancer cells into the blood. The test, which is called single color digital PCR, requires only a fraction of a tube of blood and can detect as few as three mutation-bearing molecules in a single reaction. According to ...

An international team of scientists announced they had successfully edited the DNA of human embryos. As people process the political, moral and regulatory issues of the technology — which nudges us closer to nonfiction than science fiction — researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Temple University show the time is now to involve the American public in discussions about ...

The age at which girls have their first period may influence how long they stay in education. The findings come from a study in which researchers have tried to untangle the effect of the age at first period from other complex factors that might affect time spent in education, revealing that young women who start their periods earlier may spend ...

A chance discovery has opened up a new method of finding unknown viruses. In research published in the journal Virus Evolution, scientists from Oxford University’s Department of Zoology have revealed that Next-Generation Sequencing and its associated online DNA databases could be used in the field of viral discovery. They have developed algorithms that detect DNA from viruses that happen to ...

Scientists were surprised to find fragments of DNA of extinct human species in 35 people living in islands off New Guinea in Melanesian tribes. The DNA was traceable to two early human species: Denisovans, whose remains were found in Siberia, and Neandertals, first discovered in Germany. D. Andrew Merriwether, a molecular anthropologist at Binghamton University, collected the modern-day blood samples ...