News

During his 2015 State of the Union address, then-President Barack Obama announced what he promised would be an ambitious public health project. “Tonight, I’m launching a new Precision Medicine Initiative to bring us closer to curing diseases like cancer and diabetes...

This is the 15th 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. You can read the first part here. The series...

Justin Schleede reaches onto a black lab bench to pick up a tray of small plastic tubes.

"These are saliva...

"If proven to be safe, we believe preventive gene editing could be one of the most important health technologies of...

cell
By Matthew Herper, Stat | 07.01.2026

Researchers have created what they say may count as the first synthetic cell, and have started a public benefit corporation...

cell
By Carl Zimmer and Marco Hernandez , The New York Times | 07.01.2026

Scientists have long dreamed of discovering the alchemy by which chemicals can be turned into life. On Wednesday, a team...

a graphic representing attempts to select the "best" baby
By Anna Louie Sussman, The New York Times | 07.01.2026

Birthrates in much of the developed world are at record lows, but there’s one demographic group that’s exploring new frontiers...

DNA strand
By Emily Baumgaertner Nunn, The New York Times | 06.30.2026

A research program at the National Institutes of Health released the world’s largest database of human genomes and paired them...

digital eye
By Robert P. Baird, The Guardian | 06.30.2026

In 2017, a 33-year-old political philosopher named Iason Gabriel was told by a friend that he ought to apply for a...

gene therapy graphic
By Rebecca Simkin, BioNews | 06.29.2026

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is allowing biotech company Regenxbio to reapply for licensing of a gene therapy...

biotechnology graphic on blue background
By Marisa Flook , BioNews | 06.29.2026

An anti-ageing gene therapy not approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is set to be offered by...

DNA wheel on a pink background
By Samuelle Fajutrao Falk , The Conversation | 06.26.2026

When my colleagues and I asked autistic people and parents of autistic children in Sweden how they feel about genetic...