Genetics & Molecular Biology

Cholesterol Levels Improve With Fat-Rich Diet And Weight Loss

Fat is back, at least in some sense. It has just been replaced with polyunsaturated fats in the minds of nutritionists.  Studies on low-fat, high-carbohydrate diets and the recently popular fad called the Mediterranean diet have shown similar results in w ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 30 2016 - 11:45am

Being A Morning Person Is Partially In Your DNA

A genome-wide association study has identified genetic variants associated with being a morning person. The authors identified 15 locations in DNA (loci) associated with "morningness." ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 7 2016 - 11:50pm

Stem Cell Gene Therapy Platform For Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy

Scientists have developed a new approach that could eventually be used to treat Duchenne muscular dystrophy, using CRISPR/Cas9 to correct genetic mutations that cause the disease. ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 11 2016 - 7:28pm

Pseudoscience Creeping Into Your Conference? A Case In GMOs And Glyphosate

Hijacking a Conference's Credibility ...

Article - Kevin M. Folta - Feb 13 2016 - 12:56pm

How DNA Can Fight Fabric Fraud

The most desirable cotton is distinguished by having extra-long staple fibers (Egyptian, Pima) and such cotton commands a price premium. But as the cotton moves around the world, and through the fabric value chain, there is the potential for it to be dilu ...

Article - Steve Savage - Feb 15 2016 - 4:42pm

Fruit Fly Sexuality Altered With Mutant Gene

A study of mutant fruit flies discovered that homosexual behavior in groups can be altered by their environment. Specifically, they have shown that the sexual preferences of male fruit flies with a mutant version of a gene can vary depending on whether the ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 18 2016 - 7:01am

Mitochondrial-Style Supercomputers, Powered By ATP

The substance that provides energy to many of the cells in our bodies, Adenosine triphosphate (ATP), may also be able to power the next generation of supercomputers, according to an article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), which t ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 28 2016 - 7:30am

Pseudoscience To Shine At Houston Science Museum

Houston, we have a problem.  Well, you have a problem.  The Houston Museum of Natural Science (Twitter: @HMNS) is sponsoring an event that slams science, denigrates technology, and gifts its credibility to a non-scientific movement. ...

Article - Kevin M. Folta - Mar 27 2016 - 9:47am

The Secret Science Behind Bodily Secretions

The salivary gland secretes saliva that helps us chew and swallow the food we eat while the pancreas secretes digestive juices that enable our bodies to break down the fat, protein, and carbohydrates in the food. Secretions like these are important in cou ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 5 2016 - 2:24pm

Xenotransplantation: Pig Hearts In Baboons

Could organs explanted from other mammals save human lives someday? A new study shows that genetically modified pig hearts developed by US and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich researchers can survive for more than up to 2½ years when transp ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 6 2016 - 2:29pm