Scientists at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have developed a novel electric propulsion technology for nanorobots. It allows molecular machines to move a hundred thousand times faster than with the biochemical processes used to date. This makes nanobots fast enough to do assembly line work in molecular factories. The DNA nanobot is shaped like …
James Clement has collected blood, skin or saliva from supercentenarians in 14 states and seven countries over a six-year period. Lifestyle and luck, it seems, still factor heavily into why people live into their 90s and 100s. However, supercentenarians are more uniformly healthy than centenarians in their final months and years. Rather than having won …
For many years, the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) has tracked the costs associated with DNA sequencing performed at the sequencing centers funded by the Institute. This information has served as an important benchmark for assessing improvements in DNA sequencing technologies and for establishing the DNA sequencing capacity of the NHGRI Genome Sequencing Program …
In 2014, Nextbigfuture predicted Tiger Moms as being the driver of early adoption of genetic intelligence enhancement and the lifting of the One child policy in China. China’s One child policy was being lifted just as embryo selection based upon intelligence for invitro fertilized (IVF) babies becomes possible and we are on the cusp of …
On October 18, 2017, DuPont Pioneer and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard reached an agreement to jointly provide non-exclusive licenses to foundational CRISPR-Cas9 intellectual property under their respective control for use in commercial agricultural research and product development. All entities wanting to apply the technology for agricultural applications are free to use a …
New DNA base editing platform holds potential for reversing the most common class of disease-associated DNA point mutations. Scientists at Harvard University and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard have developed a new class of genome editing tool. This new “base editor” can directly repair the type of single-letter changes in the human genome …
A team in China has taken a new approach to fixing disease genes in human embryos. The researchers created cloned embryos with a genetic mutation for a potentially fatal blood disorder, and then precisely corrected the DNA to show how the condition might be prevented at the earliest stages of development. Huang’s team is also …
DroNc-Seq — a technology that merges single-nucleus RNA sequencing with microfluidics — brings new scale to gene expression studies in complex tissues. Last year Broad researchers described a single-nucleus RNA sequencing method called sNuc-Seq. This system enabled researchers to study the gene expression profiles of difficult-to-isolate cell types as well as cells from archived tissues. …
A survey of DNA fragments circulating in the blood suggests the microbes living within us are vastly more diverse than previously known. In fact, 99 percent of that DNA has never been seen before. Of all the non-human DNA fragments the team gathered, 99 percent of them failed to match anything in existing genetic databases …
Recently the University of California, Berkeley welcomed about 300 people—scientists, CEOs, farmers, regulators, conservationists, and interested citizens to discuss CRISPR-CAS9 genetic modification. Agricultural Genetic modifications of the past were to commodity crops like corn and soy to improve their pest resistance or boost yields. It was a convenience item for farmers and a profit center …
CRISPR DNA editing is allowing correction of many diseases. But many other diseases are linked to RNA. Biotech startup Locana is using the power of CRISPR to develop treatments for disease caused by RNA. They use a technique for tracking RNA in live cells called RNA-targeting Cas9 (RCas9). In a new study, published August 10 …