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
Timnit Gebru

We read the paper that forced Timnit Gebru out of Google. Here’s what it says.

By Karen Hao , MIT Technology Review | 12.04.2020

Image: TechCrunch, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

On the evening of Wednesday, December 2, Timnit Gebru, the co-lead...

Bioethics
DNA Code

Heritable Human Genome Editing? It May Never Be Safe

By Katie Hasson, Impact Ethics | 12.04.2020

The “CRISPR babies” announced in headlines around the world recently turned two years old, and we still know nothing about...

Human Genetic Modification
New York classroom

New York Lawmakers Want Limits on Collection of Kids’ DNA

By Rachel Rippetoe, The Imprint [cites CGS' Marcy Darnovsky] | 12.03.2020

In New York City, a middle-schooler pulled over by police could end up in a largely secretive DNA database simply...

Policies
Vaccine syringe

The New Coronavirus Vaccine Is Changing The Future Of Medicine

By Caroline Seydel , Forbes | 12.02.2020

While the vaccines for Covid-19 seem to have been created in record time, the technology making them possible has been...

Patents & Other IP
Eugenics signage

U.S. mishandling of COVID echoes the 20th century eugenics movement

By Knute Berger, Crosscut | 12.01.2020

Over the past nine months, I have written about some of the parallels between the 1918-20 influenza pandemic and today’s...

U.S. Federal

“Three-Parent IVF” Might Open the Door to Human Genome Editing

By Diana Bowman, Karinne Ludlow, Walter Johnson, Slate | 12.01.2020

On Oct. 19, a team of researchers from Greece and Spain made a remarkable announcement: They had started six pregnancies...

Assisted Reproduction
Cradles and a globe

Continuing issues and debate concerning transnational commercial surrogacy during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond

By Yuri Hibino, Sonia Allan, and Damian Adams, BioNews | 11.30.2020

The regulation of surrogacy varies around the world. Most countries that have laws, prohibit all forms of surrogacy, while several...

Assisted Reproduction

Why we should use mild stimulation in egg donation

By Guido Pennings, BioNews | 11.30.2020

There are two strong ethical reasons to avoid harm to egg donors: a duty to minimise harm and the proportionality...

Assisted Reproduction