Menu Close

Articles on Genetics

Displaying 441 - 460 of 659 articles

If some foods weird out your taste buds, read on to see if you fall in the ‘supertaster’ quarter of the population. parkydoodles/Flickr (cropped)

Abhor asparagus and can’t stand coffee? You may be a supertaster

There are natural variations between humans in our senses. We need different prescriptions to correct our eyesight. Some people say that vinyl sounds better than CDs or MP3s and will pay big money for…
There’s no one universal ‘intelligence gene’ but many thousands each contributing a small increment – and here are three. Andrew Huff/Flickr (cropped)

Intelligence inheritance – three genes that add to your IQ score

Intelligence, cognitive ability or cognitive performance is usually measured by a battery of tests that aim to quantify skills such as memory and analytical ability. There is loads of variation between…
Is beauty in the face of the beheld? Shutterstock

Facial symmetry and good health may not be related

Beauty, it is said, is in the eye of the beholder. And yet, there are many faces that a majority would find beautiful, say, George Clooney’s or Audrey Hepburn’s. Psychologists interested in mate selection…

New genetic risk factors for Parkinson’s

Researchers have combined data analysis with genomic techniques and found six new genetic risk factors for Parkinson’s disease…
Domesticated mammals, including dogs, share a number of characteristic features. Klearchos Kapoutsis/Flickr

Why so many domesticated mammals have floppy ears

Take a look at several domesticated mammal species and you might spot a number of similarities between them, including those cute floppy ears. The famous naturalist and evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin…
Many of the genes for maths and reading overlap. Businessman via alphaspirit/Shutterstock

Better at reading than maths? Don’t blame it all on your genes

I disliked and feared maths for most of my school career and dropped it as soon as I possibly could. My mother recalls me crying as a five-year-old because: “I can’t do the people-on-the-bus sums”. If…
The pigeon is still blaming humans though. Wagner Free Institute

Humans not entirely at fault for passenger pigeon extinction

Once the most numerous bird species in North America, passenger pigeons went from numbering in the billions to being extinct in less than a century. Their decline has been mostly blamed on intensive hunting…
Genetics is just the latest specialist knowledge threatening to take the question of criminal responsibility away from law and hand it over to science. Graham/Flickr

Genes made me do it: genetics, responsibility and criminal law

Welcome to Biology and Blame, a series of articles examining historical and current influences on the notion of criminal responsibility. Today, Arlie Loughnan considers the challenge to the legal system…

Top contributors

More