October 2, 2025
(MIT Technology Review) – A team at Microsoft says it used artificial intelligence to discover a “zero day” vulnerability in the biosecurity systems used to prevent the misuse of DNA. These screening systems are designed to stop people from purchasing … Read More
October 1, 2025
Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy (vol. 28, no. 3, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
September 29, 2025
(Discover) – The vaccine is a modified version of the COVID-19 mRNA lipid nanoparticle vaccines. To create the allergy vaccine, researchers adjusted the mRNA message: instead of producing spike proteins like in the COVID-19 vaccine, the allergy vaccine instructs cells … Read More
September 29, 2025
(Aeon) – Countless species are dying from human-induced environmental change. Should we use genetic technology to alter and save them? It wasn’t our intention that humanity would become the planet’s greatest evolutionary force; yet the fact that we are confronts … Read More
September 29, 2025
Journal of Medical Ethics (vol. 51, no. 9, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
September 24, 2025
(BBC) – One of the cruellest and most devastating diseases – Huntington’s – has been successfully treated for the first time, say doctors. The disease runs through families, relentlessly kills brain cells and resembles a combination of dementia, Parkinson’s and … Read More
September 23, 2025
(New York Times) – Gene therapies for rare diseases are frequently developed then discarded by drug companies because they can’t afford to produce the treatment for more patients. The problem is economics. The science is there to cure Mr. Atteberry’s … Read More
September 15, 2025
(Wired) – At the WIRED Health summit, biochemist David Liu said his lab is on the verge of revealing a new gene-editing technique that could target multiple unrelated diseases. At the WIRED Health summit last week, Harvard biochemist and gene-editing … Read More
September 11, 2025
(Wired) – Gene-edited pancreatic cells have been transplanted into a patient with type 1 diabetes for the first time. They produced insulin for months without the patient needing to take immunosuppressants. In this experiment, edited cells produced insulin for months … Read More
September 8, 2025
European Journal of Human Genetics (vol. 33, no. 8, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
September 1, 2025
(Nature) – A map of DNA methylation changes in human organs could help researchers to discover more targets for anti-ageing therapies. The visible effects of ageing on our body are in part linked to invisible changes in gene activity. The … Read More
August 25, 2025
(Daily Mail) – Cutting-edge technology could one day transform treatment for Down syndrome, as researchers have successfully deleted an extra chromosome in lab-grown cells. Down syndrome – which occurs when a person has three copies of chromosome 21 instead of … Read More
August 25, 2025
(New York Times) – If cherishing the suffering can make a nation kind, then discarding the suffering makes it cruel. It can breed a sense of contempt — why should we care for this hopeless cause? — and when our … Read More
August 25, 2025
(Science News) – Scientists have, for the first time, transplanted a genetically engineered pig lung into a human. The lung tissue remained alive for nine days after the transplant despite early signs of inflammation, researchers report August 25 in Nature … Read More
August 22, 2025
(MIT Technology Review) – My relatives didn’t get a vote when I added my genetic profile to a crime-fighting database. In 2018, police in California announced they’d caught the Golden State Killer, a man who had eluded capture for decades. They … Read More
August 19, 2025
(New York Times) – The Department of Health and Human Services recently announced it would wind down 22 mRNA vaccine development projects under the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA, halting nearly $500 million in investments. This decision … Read More
August 15, 2025
(Nature) – Stunning results in mice herald gene-editing advances for neurological diseases. Scientists are closing in on the ability to apply genome editing to a formidable new target: the human brain. In the past two years, a spate of technological … Read More
August 13, 2025
(Wall Street Journal) – Tech execs are paying tens of thousands to find brilliant dates or select high-IQ embryos. ‘They want to raise high-performing children.’ Tsvi Benson-Tilsen, a mathematician, spent seven years researching how to keep an advanced form of … Read More
August 11, 2025
(NBC News) – The vaccine doesn’t prevent cancer from happening in the first place, but an early-phase trial found it could reduce the odds of recurrence. In an early trial, a one-size-fits-all vaccine showed promise in preventing hard-to-treat pancreatic cancers … Read More
August 11, 2025
(The Free Press) – I’ve spent hours talking to the ‘Chinese Frankenstein’ who says he’s opening a lab in Austin. His competition, in his quest to pioneer gene editing in the United States? It’s his ex. I’m speaking to him … Read More
August 7, 2025
(New York Times) – For as little as $2,500, you can choose your future baby. Should you? Would you use an algorithm to select your embryos? Enter Orchid, a company that promises parents the ability to protect their future children … Read More
August 6, 2025
(NPR) – China imprisoned the scientist, He Jiankui, for three years for violating medical regulations. Fast forward to today: Mainstream scientific organizations are encouraging very careful basic research to explore gene-editing and human reproduction. But they still warn any attempts … Read More
July 31, 2025
(Science) – Analysis of DNA from 23andMe users points to variants in genes linked to brain function and sense of rhythm In The King’s Speech, the 2010 biopic that portrays the United Kingdom’s King George VI’s lifelong struggle with his … Read More
July 25, 2025
(MIT Technology Review) – It has been a grim few months for the Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) community. There had been some excitement when, a couple of years ago, a gene therapy for the disorder was approved by the US … Read More
July 23, 2025
European Journal of Human Genetics (vol. 33, no. 7, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: