Is Lander’s revisionist CRISPR history sexist?

Explosive disagreements over the origins of CRISPR, the leading methodology for editing genes, were inevitable. CRISPR has given scientists (and journalists) dizzying dreams of a near-unlimited ability to manipulate the genomes of animals and plants,

Food fights: the new dietary guidelines, fats, salt, sugar, edible GMOs

If you read anything at all about the US Department of Agriculture’s 2015 dietary guidelines, which have finally been issued now that it is 2016, it was probably a diatribe arguing that the government was

The cancer moonshot and other future science fantasies

Last Friday, On Science Blogs was given over to the many “best of science” lists of 2015. This week’s post is about what bloggers foresee for 2016–and beyond. THE CANCER MOONSHOT: WELCOME TO 2016 Vice-President

More on gene editing rules, CRISPR in humans and dogs, bioethics & breakthroughs

THE HUMAN GENE EDITING SUMMIT, CONT’D Citizens seeking to understand what was decided at last week’s Human Gene Editing Summit might be understandably confused by the contradictions in these headlines: Scientific community approves human gene

Psychology cleans up its act, plus biohackers embrace gene editing, CRISPR, cyborgs

THE MESS IN PSYCHOLOGY AND OTHER SCIENCES TOO You’d think that the just-published Science paper, recounting a massive  attempt at replication of 100 selected research projects published in the top psychology journals in 2008, would be cause for much beating … Continue reading »

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Pinker’s gene editing rant ignored most bioethics issues; debunking stoner Shakespeare

Do you suppose Steven Pinker’s broadside against professional bioethics oversight of CRISPR and other forms of gene editing–Pinker’s command to bioethics was brutally inflexible: “Get out of the way”–will change bioethics for the better? Or gene editing, for that matter? … Continue reading »

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Update on gene editing of human embryos–and other organisms

  The National Academy of Sciences has confirmed officially that yes, as rumored for weeks, it will hold a meeting to thrash out issues posed by the new gene editing techniques. These will probably be ethical and policy issues mostly. … Continue reading »

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Homo sap is now a GMO. Shall we edit the genes of human embryos?

Well, the rumors that scientists in China have been messing around with fully predictable genetic engineering of human embryos, discussed here at On Science Blogs a month ago, turn out to be true. Fully predictable hell has broken out. More … Continue reading »

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SynBio B***********: Genetic recoding. Also, measles goes to Disneyland

  An early triumph for the infant synthetic biology? Do you suppose Science‘s Breakthrough (Arrrrgh!) of the Year for 2015 has already arrived? In January, no less? Via two papers in Nature? Which venue, I suppose, might take it out … Continue reading »

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From GMOs to GROs: Will Life Find a Way?

A pair of papers in this week’s Nature introduces GROs — “genomically recoded organisms” — whose altered genetic code makes them require a synthetic amino acid to survive. Although this new type of biocontainment indeed keeps microorganisms from spreading to … Continue reading »

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