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Ready for a world in which a $50 DNA test can predict your odds of earning a PhD or forecast which toddler gets into a selective preschool? Robert Plomin, a behavioral geneticist, says that’s exactly what’s coming. For decades genetic researchers have sought the hereditary factors behind intelligence, with little luck. But now gene studies have finally gotten big enough—and hence powerful enough—to zero in on genetic differences linked to IQ. A year ago, no gene had ever been tied to performance on an IQ test. Since then, more than 500 have, thanks to gene studies involving more than 200,000...

In the early 19th century, Jean-François Champollion used the Rosetta Stone to begin the process of deciphering the hieroglyphics of ancient Egypt. We already knew Egypt through the Bible and the histories of the Greeks, but even Herodotus wrote 2,000 years after the beginning of the Old Kingdom. With the translation of hieroglyphics, the legend of Egypt came to life. What had been cloudy became clear. In Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past, David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard’s Medical School and the Broad Institute, introduces us to...

Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky is calling for a “cultural revolution” in how people consume online news so that “more shame" no longer means “more clicks” and more advertising income. Lewinsky told hundreds of privacy professionals Tuesday “we need to communicate online with compassion, consume news with compassion, and click with compassion." "Just imagine walking a mile in someone else’s headline," she said in a Washington speech that was contractually closed to the press.

Burials from a cave in Morocco have yielded the oldest human DNA evidence yet from Africa, offering new insight into Stone Age migrations. The DNA samples come from one of the most ancient cemeteries in the world, the Grotte des Pigeons, near the village of Taforalt in northeast Morocco. Beginning around 15,000 years ago, a culture of hunter-gatherers buried their dead with animal horns and other adornments inside this cave. Though burials were found as recently as 2006, archaeologists have been excavating the cave since the 1940s. The name 20th-century researchers gave to this culture —the Iberomaurusians—reflects the theory that...

A more sustainable pint of craft beer possibly coming to a pub near you +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Hoppy beer is all the rage among craft brewers and beer lovers, and now UC Berkeley biologists have come up with a way to create these unique flavors and aromas without using hops. The researchers created strains of brewer's yeast that not only ferment the beer but also provide two of the prominent flavor notes provided by hops. In double-blind taste tests, employees of Lagunitas Brewing Company in Petaluma, California, characterized beer made from the engineered strains as more hoppy than a control beer...

[A]rticles claiming that the mission activated Kelly's “space genes,” that 7 percent of his genes didn't return to normal post-spaceflight, and that he and Mark are no longer identical twins..... these stories are biologically impossible. If 7 percent of Kelly's genome was altered, he would be about as different from a human as a rhesus monkey. ... Your genome dwells inside the nuclei of your cells. Think of it as an instruction manual: It is the complete set of DNA that describes the form and function of every aspect of your being, with each gene pertaining to a particular task life requires. But this manual...

Modern humans co-existed and interbred not only with Neanderthals, but also with another species of archaic humans, the mysterious Denisovans.

“Scott’s telomeres (endcaps of chromosomes that shorten as one ages) actually became significantly longer in space,” NASA researchers wrote in a statement. The space agency added that Kelly had hundreds of “space genes” activated by the year-long flight which reportedly altered the astronaut’s “immune system, DNA repair, bone formation networks, hypoxia, and hypercapnia.” While Scott Kelly’s height and 93 percent of his DNA returned to normal after returning to Earth, NASA confirmed that seven percent of his genes have remained changed and may stay that way. “This is thought to be from the stresses of space travel, which can cause...

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) in an interview broadcast Sunday said she knows who she is when pressed about her claims of Native-American heritage. She was questioned during an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press" about an editorial in a Massachusetts newspaper, "Warren must resolve debate on heritage, which said a DNA test would "permanently resolve the issue." “Look, I do know. I know who I am. And never used it for anything. Never got any benefit from it anywhere," Warren said.

Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas told the United Nations Security Council that PA residents are the direct descendants of the Canaanites, claiming that ‘Palestine’ made significant contributions to humanity prior to the 1917 Balfour Declaration. During his address at the UN Security Council in which he called on the international community to hold a Middle East peace conference, with the goal of launching multilateral negotiations, Abbas claimed that the Arab residents of Judea, Samaria, and Gaza were in fact descended from the ancient Canaanites. "We are the descendants of the Canaanites who lived in the land of Palestine 5,000 years...

In a review published in the journal Trends in Genetics on January 25, scientists at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing discuss what we know about the genetics of ancient individuals from Eurasia (Europe and Western Asia) between 45,000-7,500 years ago. The authors summarized work that investigated the genomes of more than 20 ancients in the Eurasian family tree, including the 45,000-year-old Ust'-Ishim individual from Central Siberia... ..."But with the information from the several individuals available for ancient DNA sequencing we do have hints at interesting population structure, migration and interaction in East Asia." The researchers learned that in...

This April, Harper will publish Chasing Hillary, a new political memoir from New York Times writer-at-large Amy Chozick, EW can confirm exclusively. The book will provide a remarkably intimate and deeply personal portrait of Hillary Clinton as she withstood two dramatic losses for the presidency. Chozick’s book is the result of a decade’s worth of reporting on the former U.S. Secretary of State. Chozick’s front-row seat to Clinton’s presidential campaign implosion in 2008 led to her getting assigned the “Hillary Beat” through to 2016, when she’d once again face a painful defeat, this time in the general election to Donald...

NASA astronauts successfully sequenced the DNA of microbes found aboard the International Space Station, marking the first time unknown organisms were sequenced and identified entirely in space. Previously, microbes had to be sent to Earth for analysis, and this new sequencing marks an important step in diagnosing astronaut illnesses and, someday, identifying any DNA-based life found on other planets... ... As a part of the Genes in Space-3 mission, astronauts on the space station last year touched a petri plate to surfaces on the space station and grew the bacteria found there into colonies, which NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson used...

Josiah Zayner, 36, recently made headlines by becoming the first person to use the revolutionary gene-editing tool Crispr to try to change their own genes. Part way through a talk on genetic engineering, Zayner pulled out a syringe apparently containing DNA and other chemicals designed to trigger a genetic change in his cells associated with dramatically increased muscle mass. He injected the DIY gene therapy into his left arm, live-streaming the procedure on the internet. The former Nasa biochemist, based in California, has become a leading figure in the growing “biohacker” movement, which involves loose collectives of scientists, engineers, artists,...

Accidental find that could revolutionize North America Archeology "Jim Paces, a geochronologist at the U.S. Geological Survey in Denver, took dozens of slices from a rib and two femurs. Each slice, no wider than a millimeter, was dissolved in nitric acid. "The resulting solution contained trace amounts of uranium and thorium, which Paces extracted. After measuring those concentrates in a mass spectrometer, Paces concluded that the bones were 130,700 years old, plus or minus 9,400 years." "The conclusion seemed clear: Hominids, wandering through Southern California, had found a mastodon carcass and gone to work. They hauled cobblestones to the site...

From DNA samples to iris scans, Chinese authorities are using free physical exams to gather and store biological data from millions of people who live in the country's far west region of Xinjiang, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday, citing an official document that suggests the government's surveillance program in the region is even wider than previously believed. Xinjiang, the historical home of the Uighur ethnic group, has become a testing ground for heavy-handed, high-tech surveillance measures by the government over the past year. China says the measures are necessary to combat extremist violence, but critics say they violate the...

Who were your ancestors? What is your ethnic background composed of? Sites like Ancestry.com and 23andme have always been some go to sources in answering all of your toughest questions. But how accurate are they? In a recent interview with Cracked, one of the major ancestry testing companies, (which specific company is unknown) spilled the beans on what really happens when you purchase an ancestry kit. While I can’t say I’m surprised, you may be shocked to learn that these ancestry sites aren’t always as accurate as they claim to be. Beyond this, they’ve also admitted to tampering with the...

Companies today are strategizing about future investments and technologies such as artificial intelligence, the internet of things, or growth around new business models. While many of these trends will make for solid investments for the next 5-10 years, fewer companies are considering the revolutionary convergence of disparate trends pulled from technology, behavioral and societal changes, and medical advances to understand how they will converge to transform society. This transformation will be messy, complex, and sometimes scary, but signals already point to a future of humanity that will blur our identities into “transhumanism.” A few of the trends that emerged from...

Millions of people have handed their DNA over to genetic testing companies like Ancestry or 23andMe to learn more about their family trees. But when you ship off your saliva, law enforcement could have access to your DNA. Police could use genetic information it gets from those companies to identify you in a criminal investigation, even if you’ve never used one of those services. Jacksonville resident Eric Yarham wanted to learn more about his family tree, so he mailed off his saliva to 23andMe. “Just trying to unravel the mystery that is your genetics,” said Yarham, who lives in the...

New forensic DNA analysis that can create an eerily accurate image of an unknown individual helped cops in Texas solve a year-old murder mystery. Ryan Riggs, 21, is charged with capital murder for the killing of Chantay Blankinship, 25, in May 2016. The man gave confessions to his local church and the Brown County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday after predictive DNA imaging released Nov. 8 breathed new life into law enforcement’s investigation.