Chromosomes and genes contain the blueprint for your physical characteristics. But your parents’ health and diet before you were conceived can also affect how your genes are expressed – and impact your…
Mistakes in the paper version of the Encyclopædia Britannica took a long time to correct – years often passed between revised editions – but these days editing information is much easier. In electronic…
A chemical found in hair bleach may help answer questions about the origins of life and explain why new life does not emerge on modern Earth. Hydrogen peroxide may have helped transform RNA (ribonucleic…
Holiday in Hawaii and one of the birds you’re most likely to encounter is the chicken. You find them everywhere from beaches, to car parks and on walks through the bushland. The locals warn that your chance…
Genomes from the 500-year-old remains of King Richard III and a direct living descendant are to be sequenced by scientists, which could reveal more about the life of the last king to be killed in battle…
Last October, scientists in California sequenced the DNA for the “type H” botulinum toxin. One gram of this toxin would be sufficient to kill half a billion people, making it the deadliest substance yet…
Changes to the genes of people that undergo oral immunotherapy because of a peanut allergy could provide a way of testing if the treatment is working, according to findings in a new study. Peanut allergies…
An international team of researchers has found that the cause of schizophrenia is even more complex than already believed, with rare gene mutations contributing to the disorder. In two studies published…
A person is wrongly convicted of a serious crime, then fresh evidence reveals they are, in fact, innocent. It’s a thriller movie formula and you’d hope that if this were to happen, justice would prevail…
If your great-grandparents lived through a famine, their experience could well have altered their genetic code. And three generations later you could well be showing signs of that change. The idea that…
On the same day that the latest instalment of the Jurassic Park film series has been confirmed, a study published in the journal PLOS One has detailed experiments that seem to demonstrate once and for…
The deliberate act of falsely representing, labelling or advertising food, known as “food fraud”, is not a recent phenomenon. The deceitful adulteration of food has a long history based on the promise…
Some recent headlines from Australian newspapers: NSW hospitals worst place for Golden Staph; CA-MRSA - the killer in our midst; Superbug onslaught. By now, most people are aware that antibiotic-resistant…
Some viruses are like tiny powerhouses. They are only nanometers in size, but their insides are jam-packed with DNA that is so highly pressurised that it explodes out during infection. Herpes simplex 1…