I took a DNA ancestry test. It didn’t tell me where my ancestors came from. At-home DNA ancestry tests have become hugely popular in recent years. More than 26 million have taken one, and if the kits’ marketing is to be believed, the tests can help you learn where your DNA comes from — and… Continue reading What DNA ancestry tests can — and can’t — tell you
Tag: DNA
The race to save the planet from plastic
Scientists are trying to accelerate evolution to make plastics rot. A tiny new organism is showing them how. Sometime between 2010 and 2015, a tiny organism with an unusual appetite made a home in an industrial site near a bottle-recycling plant in Sakai, Japan. The site, located by a bustling port in one of the… Continue reading The race to save the planet from plastic
Male scientists are often cast as lone geniuses. Here’s what happened when a woman was.
The sexist backlash against the woman involved with the black hole image, explained. Just after the Event Horizon Telescope project announced last week that its astronomers had managed to capture the first-ever image of a black hole, MIT tweeted this image. Here’s the moment when the first black hole image was processed, from the eyes… Continue reading Male scientists are often cast as lone geniuses. Here’s what happened when a woman was.
Does a year in space make you older or younger?
The NASA Twins study – featuring astronaut twins Scott and Mark Kelly – was the perfect space experiment. Scott spent a year in space aboard the International Space Station. Mark remained on Earth. The results? Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/year-in-space-human-body-twins-study…
Study Debunks ‘Depression Genes’
Mae Chan, Prevent Disease Waking Times A new University of Colorado Boulder study assessing genetic and survey data from 620,000 individuals found that the 18 most highly-studied candidate genes for depression are actually no more associated with it than randomly chosen genes. Everyone experiences some unhappiness, often as a result of a change, either in the… Continue reading Study Debunks ‘Depression Genes’
Disease Prediction Scores Based on DNA Have a Racial Bias, Study Finds
Scores for predicting disease risk based on genetics are on average almost five times less accurate for people of African ancestry, two times less accurate for East Asians, and 1.6 times less accurate for Hispanic or Latino Americans, compared to people of European descent, a paper published Friday in Nature Genetics has found. The paper… Continue reading Disease Prediction Scores Based on DNA Have a Racial Bias, Study Finds
DNA from 6000-year-old chewing gum reveals how an ancient woman lived
Lola lived 6000 years ago and made glue by chewing birch bark pitch. By analysing DNA left on the pitch we know about her diet, appearance, and ancestry Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2188865-dna-from-6000-year-old-chewing-gum-reveals-how-an-ancient-woman-lived/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…