genetics, genetics & genomics

A genomic interrogation of homosexuality turns up speculative links between genetic elements and sexual orientation, but researchers say the study is too small to be significant. 

Among this year’s winners are a geneticist who revealed how plants respond to shade and a group of physicists who mapped the universe’s background radiation.

The switch from maternal factors involves dynamic reprogramming of the zygotic genome.

With the arrival of a new class of single-nucleotide editors, researchers can target the most common type of pathogenic SNP in humans.

Professionals in the genetics field generally support editing the genomes of somatic cells, mirroring public opinion, but diverge from nonexperts when it comes to germline editing.

In lab populations of genetically engineered mosquitoes, mutations arose that blocked the gene drive’s spread and restored female fertility.

Researchers use gold nanoparticles to deliver CRISPR-Cas9 and correct a point mutation in a mouse model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. 

Researchers encoded moving images in DNA within living cells.

Researchers use base-editing to swap out an erroneous nucleotide responsible for a potentially life-threatening blood disorder.

OCT4 is necessary for blastocyst formation in the human embryo, researchers report.

Researchers are using the powerful gene-editing tool to recreate the woolly mammoth.

To expand the basic nucleotide alphabet, many species modify their DNA with epigenetic marks.

Multiple DNA breaks at either the centromere or the long arm of the mouse Y chromosome cause it to fragment and disappear.

Slight sequence differences confound target sites in precision genome-editing, a study shows.

The embryos, whose genes were altered by CRISPR, were not intended for implantation. 

A new genetic analysis contradicts a 2016 study proposing that our canine companions were domesticated from two distinct populations.

The memory of a temperature spike can persist for as many as 14 generations in C. elegans.

New starring roles for nucleic acids

Transfer RNA fragments prevent jumping genes from hopping around in the mouse embryo, when histone methylation can’t do the job.