News

Cathy Tie slips on a white lab coat bearing her name and the logo of her startup: Origin Genomics. "Welcome!" she says as she leads an NPR reporter, photographer and videographer on an exclusive tour of Origin's labs located...

This is the 17th 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 Osagie K. Obasogie in...

THE INSTAGRAM POST, precision-guided by sex and age, had zeroed in on its target. Yuchen Tu is a conser­vatory-trained viola...

This is the 16th installment in the Legacies of Eugenics series, which features essays by leading thinkers devoted to exploring...

Close up of doctor's gloved hands holding a pipette and a test tube.
By Ike Swetlitz, STAT News | 05.22.2018

The Food and Drug Administration will soon be alerting companies that certain gene therapies in development can qualify for less...

Close up of Canadian currency. Blue, purple, and green bills.
By Alana Cattapan, CBC News | 05.22.2018

Paying for certain reproductive services in Canada — including egg donation, sperm donation and surrogacy — is currently illegal, but...

A mosaic made of primarily blue, black, and green tiles forms a radial pattern around a central circle.
By Carl Zimmer, The New York Times | 05.21.2018

James Priest couldn’t make sense of it. He was examining the DNA of a desperately ill baby, searching for a...

Illustration of CRISPR Cas9 gene editing technology in action. An orange strand of DNA is split apart and a pink strand is inserted into the gap.
By Kurt Cobb, Resilience | 05.20.2018

Margaret Atwood’s 2003 novel Oryx and Crake depicts the evolution and aftermath of a bioengineered global catastrophe. Whether Atwood at...

Image of the planet Earth from space.
By Megan Molteni, Wired | 05.18.2018

Yanny or Laurel—could the secret to which word you hear be in your DNA? It’s a notion someone pitched at...

Front of Ohio State House. Lawn, building, and two American flags.
By Rebecca B. Reingold and Lawrence O. Gostin, JAMA | 05.18.2018

In December 2017, Ohio passed into law legislation that prohibited physicians from performing abortions if the pregnant woman’s decision was...

A row of brightly colored blue, purple, yellow and red eggs sits in the snow
By Ariana Eunjung Cha, The Washington Post | 05.18.2018

When 27-year-old Rita Ora announced recently that she had frozen her eggs, she joined a long list of celebrities touting...

A genealogy chart made up of pink and blue rectangles used by Snohomish County Sheriff to identify suspect in 1987 murder case.
By Heather Murphy, The New York Times | 05.18.2018

In 1987, Jay Cook, 20, and Tanya Van Cuylenborg, 18, a couple from Canada, were brutally killed while they were...