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In the U.S., it’s illegal to edit genes in human embryos with the intention of creating a genetically engineered baby. But according to the Wall Street Journal, Bay Area startups are focused on just that. It wouldn’t be the first...

This is Ask An Expert, where every weekday at 9:20am, KCBS Radio is giving you direct access to top experts in various fields. Today: Gene-editing technology allows scientists to work with DNA in unprecedented ways, but there are larger scientific...

For months, a small company in San Francisco has been pursuing a secretive project: the birth of a genetically engineered...

Pronatalism is an old idea with roots in eugenics and nationalism, that is now fashionable among far-right influencers and policymakers. They talk...

artificial womb graphic
By Lucy Tu, The Guardian | 11.05.2025

Beth Schafer lay in a hospital bed, bracing for the birth of her son. The first contractions rippled through her...

stem cells
By Patrick Foong, BioNews | 11.03.2025

Recently, the US Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from stem cell clinics, which challenged the Food and Drug...

kidney transplant graphic
By Lauran Neergaard, AP News | 11.03.2025

WASHINGTON (AP) — The first clinical trial is getting underway to see if transplanting pig kidneys into people might really...

gene therapy graphic
By Heidi Ledford, Nature | 10.31.2025

Late last year, dozens of researchers spanning thousands of miles banded together in a race to save one baby boy’s...

A graphic of two people in labcoats next to a DNA strand
By Antonio Regalado, MIT Technology Review | 10.31.2025

A West Coast biotech entrepreneur says he’s secured $30 million to form a public-benefit company to study how to safely...

graphic of a DNA strand and its base pairings.
By Emily Mullin, Wired | 10.30.2025

In 2018, Chinese scientist He Jiankui shocked the world when he revealed that he had created the first gene-edited babies...

eugenics graphic
By B.A. Parker & Gene Demby, NPR | 10.29.2025

What do conservatives like JD Vance and tech executives like Elon Musk have in common? They, like other pronatalists, want...

Flag of the Republic of China (aka Taiwan)
By Jing-han Chen, Global Taiwan Institute | 10.29.2025

Flag of the Republic of China (aka Taiwan)
Sun Yat-sen, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Introduction: Surrogacy Debates in

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