News

Surrogacy goes more mainstream

By Carly Mallenbaum, Axios [cites Emily Galpern] | 03.29.2026

More Americans are turning to surrogacy to build their families, as the practice becomes more common and more publicly discussed.

Why it matters: As surrogacy becomes more visible and accessible, ethical, legal and cultural tensions become harder to ignore...

U.S. Federal

Eugenics and the Modern Synthesis, Part I

By Jessica Riskin, Los Ángeles Review of Books | 03.23.2026

This is the first part of the 14th installment in the Legacies of Eugenics series, which features essays by leading thinkers devoted to exploring the history of eugenics and the ways it shapes our present. The series is organized by...

Civil Society

Surrogacy laws are all over the map

By Carly Mallenbaum, Axios [cites Surrogacy360] | 03.29.2026

Without a federal law, surrogacy in the U.S. is governed by a patchwork of state regulations/

Why it matters: Confusing...

Policies

Project Eugenics: The Rollback of Disability Rights

By Kiana Jackson and Shannon Stubblefield, New Disabled South | 02.09.2026

^{"MC0_8230" via Wikimedia Commons licensed under CC by 2.0}

This report documents a deliberate assault on disabled people in...

U.S. States

FDA approves CRISPR gene therapy trials for sickle cell disease

By Catherine Hsu, The Daily Californian | 04.01.2021

CRISPR genome editing technology, which was developed at UC Berkeley, has been approved for clinical trials to correct gene mutations...

Genetic Selection

UC launches gene therapy trial to transform the treatment of sickle cell disease

By Lisa M. Krieger, The Mercury News | 03.31.2021

^{"Sickle cell disease (SCD)" by National Institutes

of Health (NIH)}^{is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0}

A team of University...

Human Genetic Modification

Your Face Is Not Your Own

By Kashmir Hill, The New York Times | 03.18.2021

^{Photo by Dan Nelson on Unsplash}

In May 2019, an agent at the Department of Homeland Security received a trove...

U.S. Federal

Criminal defendants still cite a ‘gene for violence.’ It doesn’t exist.

By Nita Farahany and Gene E. Robinson, The Washington Post | 03.18.2021

The New Mexico Supreme Court ruled last month on an extraordinarily important question: Should a criminal defendant be allowed...

Genomics

Human Genetics Needs an Antiracism Plan

By Lea K. Davis, Scientific American | 03.17.2021

The study of human genetics emerged from a deep curiosity of our human inheritance that was firmly rooted in white...

Scientists Create Living Entities In The Lab That Closely Resemble Human Embryos

By Rob Stein, NPR | 03.17.2021

For decades, science has been trying to unlock the mysteries of how a single cell becomes a fully formed human...

Human Genetic Modification

A mouse embryo has been grown in an artificial womb—humans could be next

By Antonio Regalado, MIT Technology Review | 03.17.2021

The photographs alone tell a fantastic story—a mouse embryo, complete with beating heart cells, a head, and the beginning of...

Animal Biotechnologies

Scientists Grow Mouse Embryos in a Mechanical Womb

By Gina Kolata, The New York Times | 03.17.2021

The mouse embryos looked perfectly normal. All their organs were developing as expected, along with their limbs and circulatory and...

Animal Biotechnologies