News

Developments in gene-editing technology raise new ethical questions

By [cites CGS' Katie Hasson], KCBS Radio | 11.19.2025

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...

U.S. Federal

Genetically Engineered Babies Are Banned. Tech Titans Are Trying to Make One Anyway.

By Emily Glazer, Katherine Long, Amy Dockser Marcus, The Wall Street Journal | 11.08.2025

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

Backed by OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman and his husband, along with Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong, the startup—called...

Genetic Selection

Who Gets to Procreate and Parent? A Black Feminist Critique of the Pronatalist Agenda

By Jallicia A. Jolly, Sydney Curtis and Nicole Sessions, Ms. Magazine | 10.17.2025

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

U.S. Federal

Does One Size Fit All?

By Jay S. Kaufman, Los Angeles Review of Books | 09.27.2025

This is the 10th installment in the Legacies of Eugenics series, which features essays by leading thinkers devoted to exploring...

Society

The Baby-Making Business: on the front lines of Toronto’s booming, semi-legal surrogacy market

By Alison Motluk, Toronto Life | 02.03.2014
Cindy Wasser’s first date with Chris Blake, the man who would become her husband, was a disaster. He tripped on...
Other Countries

Poll Shows We Want Those DNA Breakthroughs But Worry Scientists May Be 'Playing God'

By Emily Swanson, Huffington Post | 02.02.2014
Most Americans are excited about the possibility of scientific breakthroughs brought by DNA research, a new HuffPost/YouGov poll finds. But...
Bioethics

On Race and Medicine

By Keith Norris, The Scientist | 02.01.2014
Clinical trials were traditionally conducted using predominately white male subjects. However, the 1993 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Revitalization Act...
Biopolitics

Why we Should Opt Out of the Government's New Patient Database

By Edward Hockings, The Guardian | 01.31.2014
We have until March to opt out of the care.data initiative. The ‘theoretical risk’ that we might be...
Bioethics

Kercher Trial: How Does DNA Contamination Occur?

By Melissa Hogenboom, BBC | 01.30.2014
Potential for the contamination of forensic DNA evidence has been highlighted by the Meredith Kercher murder trial. But just how...
Bioethics

First Monkeys with Customized Mutations Born

By Helen Shen, Nature | 01.30.2014
The ultimate potential of precision gene-editing techniques is beginning to be realised. Today, researchers in China report the first monkeys...
Assisted Reproduction

Stem Cell Timeline: The History of a Medical Sensation

By Andy Coghlan, New Scientist | 01.30.2014
Stem cells are the cellular putty from which all tissues of the body are made. Ever since human embryonic stem...
Biopolitics

Stanford Consortium Wins $40 Million to Create Stem Cell Genomics Center

By David Jensen, California Stem Cell Report | 01.29.2014
Directors of the California stem cell agency today approved a $40 million proposal ultimately targeted at creating medical treatments tailored...
Biopolitics