News

'Superbabies' Startup Seeks Funds for Controversial Gene Editing Push

By Sophie Alexander and Ike Swetlitz, Bloomberg | 06.25.2025

A California-startup focused on genetically editing human embryos — a step toward creating so-called designer babies — is raising money as many of Silicon Valley’s ultra-rich turn their attention to one of the most controversial technologies in medicine.

Bootstrap Bio...

Patents & Other IP

Can doctors test embryos for autism? And should they?

By Brittany Luse, Liam McBain, and Neena Pathak, NPR [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 05.28.2025

A newly available kind of genetic testing, called polygenic embryo screening, promises to screen for conditions that can include cancer, obesity, autism, bipolar disorder, even celiac disease. These conditions are informed by many genetic variants and environmental factors - so...

Genetic Selection

Why Deleting Your 23andMe Data Is a Political Imperative

By Katie Sagaser, The DNA Exchange | 05.27.2025

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this piece are solely my own and do not represent those of my...

U.S. Federal

Trumpian “Common Sense” and the History of IQ Tests

By Pepper Stetler, Los Angeles Review of Books | 05.08.2025

"Donald Trump Signs The Pledge" by Michael Vadon 
is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

This is...

Society
Chaco Canyon ruins

Ancient-DNA Researchers Set Ethics Guidelines for Their Work

By Sabrina Imbler, The New York Times | 10.20.2021

Photo by pedrik on Flickr

In 2017, a team of scientists successfully extracted the DNA of members of a Pueblo...

Policies
Elephant and woolly mammoth in the snow

Before making a mammoth, ask the public

By Victoria Herridge, Nature | 10.20.2021

Image by Russ Seidel on Flickr

Every few years for the past 20 or so, the story resurfaces, frozen in...

Synthetic Biology
Photo of Alondra Nelson

“Science and Technology Now Sit in the Center of Every Policy and Social Issue”

By Alondra Nelson and William Kearney, Issues in Science and Technology | 10.19.2021

Photo of Alondra Nelson by Dan Komoda

In January 2021, President Biden appointed sociologist Alondra Nelson, a leading scholar...

U.S. Federal

In a First, Surgeons Attached a Pig Kidney to a Human, and It Worked

By Roni Caryn Rabin, The New York Times | 10.19.2021

Surgeons in New York have successfully attached a kidney grown in a genetically altered pig to a human patient and...

Animal Biotechnologies
a picture of the now removed Robert E Lee statue

Ghosting the Confederacy

By Erin Thompson, Harper's Bazaar | 10.18.2021

"Robert E. Lee IMG_2662" by OZinOH 
is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

What should happen to Confederate monuments after...

Society
Empty Vermont State House, where the apology was given

Vermont’s legislative leaders apologize for state-sanctioned eugenics movement

By Rachel Nostrant, VTDigger | 10.18.2021

Photo of Vermont State House by Don Shall on Flickr

MONTPELIER — Legislative leaders formally apologized on Saturday for Vermont’s...

Eugenics

Inside Nigeria’s unregulated human egg industry

By Mariam Adetona, Al Jazeera | 10.17.2021

It was a hot afternoon in October 2019, and 22-year-old Joan* [Names have been changed] had just been crying...

Other Countries
an egg cell with a question mark inside

Polygenic screening of embryos is here, but is it ethical?

By Philip Ball, The Guardian [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 10.17.2021

The birth of the first IVF baby, Louise Brown, in 1978 provoked a media frenzy. In comparison, a little girl...

Genomics