The Custom Baby-Experts Input

In 2015, Nature published an article in which it surveyed leading scientists about the discovery of CRISPR. The survey was sent to professionals ranging from bioethics professors to workers in the biomedical industry and 26 responded. The questions ranged from whether they considered germline engineering to be inevitable, what the major barriers there are to reaching…

Finding Einstein’s Brain Cont’d

So as you read last week, there was a lot of drama in recovering and studying Einstein’s brain. So the question becomes: Did we ever get an accurate study? Well, in 2013 a study was published in the journal Brain that showed that Einstein’s corpus callosum was thicker than a normal person’s. The corpus callosum is the part of the…

Finding Einstein’s Brain

So this blog has mostly focused on issues with genes and aging and how the more abstract pieces of biology can still be applicable to others. However, I work at the Rutgers University Press as an Editorial Intern for their Health and Clinical Medicine Department and a book we are currently working on has recently peaked…

Some Light Reading- The Gene: An Intimate History

In a world that grows more and more interconnected by the minute, at a time when humans have acquired a nearly godlike ability to prolong life and manipulate the very code of living beings, an understanding of the history and implications of this new knowledge and these new abilities is essential to maneuvering successfully through…

A Specific Case of Silencing

There are many ways to silence genes. One can fold the DNA different ways, attach molecules to it so it is not accessible, or cut a specific stretch of DNA out completely: as long as no proteins have access to the DNA to transcribe it into RNA and translate the RNA into protein, consider the gene silenced. And…

Swimming Worms: A Teaser of Monica Driscoll

How does one use C elegans to measure the effects of exercise on aging? Well for starters, one needs to be able to measure the exercise activity of microscopic worms. In Dr. Monica Driscoll’s lab this is done by placing the worms in a concoction of fluids and monitoring the way they swim for a select…

How to modify DNA without even trying: CRISPR

Just because I see this coming up in a lot of things I write about, I figure I should just do a background article on this here and then I can reference you, my lovely readers, back to it as needed. So you know all those movies and books and articles where artists worry about…

Coming Attractions: Interview with Monica Driscoll

The effects of diet and exercise on aging are issues that seem to be fairly common sense to most people at this point: eat healthy, exercise, and you will live longer right? The firm scientific answer as of now: maybe . . . Scientists are currently looking into drugs that can delay aging to the…

Gene Drives: Are we playing God?

Malaria, dengue, zika virus. Mass producing genetic modifications has the potential to revolutionize the way scientists deal with the spread of these diseases as well as conservation. Recent advances in biotechnology have allowed scientists to develop artificial gene drives, genes which can force themselves through an entire population. However, these techniques are still in development…

Rules of the Magic(of Biology)

Entropy is always increasing. If you hold to the Second Law of Thermodynamics that is. And essentially all scientists do. What is entropy? Entropy is a term used to describe the disorder of the universe. In physics or chemistry, it is measured as changes in heat, which typically increases when there is some sort of…