All posts tagged: DNA

Chinese researchers use DNA to reconstruct Emperor Wu’s face as study sheds light on his death | Science & Tech News

Chinese researchers use DNA to reconstruct Emperor Wu’s face as study sheds light on his death | Science & Tech News

Researchers have used DNA to reconstruct the face of a Chinese emperor and shed light on what might have caused his death. Emperor Wu was a ruler of the Northern Zhou dynasty in ancient China, reigning from 560 AD until 578, defeating the Northern Qi dynasty and unifying the northern part of the country. The emperor belonged to a rarely-studied nomadic group called the Xianbei that lived in modern-day Mongolia and northern and northeastern China. Almost 30 years after his tomb was discovered in northwestern China, researchers at Shanghai’s Fudan University used DNA and his nearly-complete skull to reconstruct his face in 3D. It shows the emperor had brown eyes, black hair and “dark to intermediate” skin. Researchers said the emperor “possessed a typical East or Northeast Asian appearance”. Pianpian Wei, the paper’s co-corresponding author at Fudan University, said: “Our work brought historical figures to life. “Previously people had to rely on historical records or murals to picture what ancient people looked like. “We are able to reveal the appearance of the Xianbei people directly.” …

DNA sequencing may give hope to critically ill adults in hospital

DNA sequencing may give hope to critically ill adults in hospital

Scientists genetically analysed stored blood samples collected during the Penn Medicine BioBank study Daniel Burke Photography/Penn Medicine BioBank Being in intensive care is bad enough, but it can be even worse if doctors don’t know the cause of your illness or how to treat you. DNA sequencing, however, could give a diagnosis for about 1 in 9 young adults being treated in intensive care, a US study suggests. Most of the previously unsuspected genetic conditions discovered via this approach involved a weak heart or blood vessels, or a predisposition to cancer. The findings come… Source link

Why our genetic code should remain off-limits to life insurers

Why our genetic code should remain off-limits to life insurers

YOUR life insurance company doesn’t care how much you think your life is worth, so long as you are prepared to pay a premium that covers your chosen sum. Instead, insurers are concerned with how likely it is that you will die before the end of your policy, because that determines whether they have to pay out. Despite actuarial science remaining something of an art at the moment, the number of data points insurers can use to measure our likelihood of an early death is growing exponentially. As well as our family history of illness, whether or not we smoke… Source link

Vaping ’causes same DNA changes as smoking’ and could lead to cancer | Science | News

Vaping ’causes same DNA changes as smoking’ and could lead to cancer | Science | News

Vaping ’causes the same DNA changes to cells as smoking’ and might lead to cancer, new research claims. Scientists found similar DNA changes to cheek cells in people who vape but rarely smoke that are frequently cited as the origin of cancer among those who smoke tobacco. Although the study doesn’t prove that vaping causes cancer – and though the practice is still considered safer than smoking tobacco – the new study raises questions about how harmful it is. The study, from scientists at University College London and the University of Innsbruck in Austria, underpins the importance of future long-term studies of vaping to assess its adverse health consequences. The research analysed the epigenetic effects of tobacco and e-cigarettes on DNA methylation in more than 3,500 samples to investigate the impact on cells directly exposed to tobacco – such as those in the mouth – and those not directly exposed, such as those in blood or cervical cells. The epigenome refers to an extra layer of information superimposed on our genetic material, or DNA. Whilst …

Oregon man found guilty of 1980 murder of college student after gum provides DNA link

Oregon man found guilty of 1980 murder of college student after gum provides DNA link

An Oregon man has been found guilty of murdering a college student in 1980 after he was linked to the case decades later by DNA genetic genealogy and chewing gum he discarded.  Robert Plympton, 60, was found guilty of one count of first-degree murder in the death of Barbara Mae Tucker, who was a 19-year-old student at Mt. Hood Community College when she was kidnapped, sexually assaulted and beaten to death near campus four decades ago, the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office said Monday in a news release. For years, no one knew who killed Tucker. She was killed on Jan. 15, 1980, and her body was found the following morning in a wooded area between Kane Road and a school parking lot in Gresham, Oregon, by students arriving for class, the district attorney’s office said. Barbara Mae Tucker.KGW While her case was cold for years, investigators gave the case a fresh look with advances in DNA technology. In 2000, DNA swabs taken during her autopsy were sent to the Oregon State Police Crime Lab …

Venki Ramakrishnan: Nobel-winning biologist on the most promising ways to stop ageing

Venki Ramakrishnan: Nobel-winning biologist on the most promising ways to stop ageing

ANTI-AGEING is big business. From books encouraging diets such as intermittent fasting to cosmetic creams to combat wrinkles, a multibillion-dollar industry has been built on promises to make us live longer and look younger. But how close are we really to extending our lifespan in a way that gives us extra years of healthy life? Nobel prizewinner Venki Ramakrishnan, a molecular biologist and former president of the UK’s Royal Society, is the latest to tackle this question. He has spent 25 years studying the ribosome, which is where our cells make proteins using the information encoded in our genes, at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK. In his latest book, Why We Die: The new science of ageing and the quest for immortality, he goes on a journey around the cutting-edge biology of human ageing and asks whether it will be possible to extend our lifespan in the near future. He talks to New Scientist about the recent breakthroughs in our knowledge of what causes ageing, how close we are to creating …

DNA Tests Are Uncovering the True Prevalence of Incest

DNA Tests Are Uncovering the True Prevalence of Incest

When Steve Edsel was a boy, his adoptive parents kept a scrapbook of newspaper clippings in their bedroom closet. He would ask for it sometimes, poring over the headlines about his birth. Headlines like this: “Mother Deserts Son, Flees From Hospital,” Winston-Salem Journal, December 30, 1973. The mother in question was 14 years old, “5 feet 6 with reddish brown hair,” and she had come to the hospital early one morning with her own parents. They gave names that all turned out to be fake. And by 8 o’clock that evening, just hours after she gave birth, they were gone. In a black-and-white drawing of the mother, based on nurses’ recollections, she has round glasses and sideswept bangs. Her mouth is grimly set. The abandoned boy was placed in foster care with a local couple, the Edsels, who later adopted him. Steve knew all of this growing up. His parents never tried to hide his origins, and they always gave him the scrapbook when he asked. It wasn’t until he turned 14, though, that he …

Best DNA Test for 2024

Best DNA Test for 2024

The three services above are our top choices for the best DNA test. But they weren’t the only ones we tested. What follows are some additional options, none of which eclipsed the 23andMe, Ancestry or FamilyTreeDNA in any significant fashion.  MyHeritage MyHeritage MyHeritage offers a free tier of service that includes some basic family tree-building and access to excerpts of historical documents. It also includes a report of your genetic makeup across the company’s 42 supported ethnicities, the identification of relatives and connections to them where possible.  We found MyHeritage’s user interface far less intuitive and more difficult to navigate than others. It’s one of the few companies to offer a comprehensive research database of historical documents, DNA analysis and health screening — we found the integration among them to be a bit clumsy. In 2018, MyHeritage committed a security breach, exposing the email addresses and hashed passwords of more than 92 million users. Living DNA Living DNA LivingDNA divides its offerings in a different way than others. The $90 Full Ancestry DNA kit provides an …

Dog DNA Company Insists Human DNA Is Actually Alaskan Malamute

Dog DNA Company Insists Human DNA Is Actually Alaskan Malamute

An at-home DNA testing kit for dogs claimed that human saliva returned various dog breed results — and when pressed, the firm held firm. As Boston’s WBZ-TV reports, the Toronto-based DNA My Dog company told not one but two humans who sent cheek swabs in that their results contained dog DNA, calling into question the accuracy of its tests. The dog DNA debacle began last fall, when the local broadcaster reported that a New Hampshire woman decided to do an informal experiment, sending in a sample from her own cheek saliva without telling the company just to see what would happen. The company claims it sequenced her genome and found that she was 28 percent bulldog, 40 percent border collie, and 32 percent cane corso. When asked about the results, a DNA My Dog representative told WBZ-TV that one of the woman’s two cheek swabs contained canine DNA — an eyebrow-raising claim — and the breakdown it supplied her with “would not be possible on a human sample.” To get to the bottom of the strange case of …

How our “junk DNA” led to humans being tailless

How our “junk DNA” led to humans being tailless

Take a look around the animal kingdom, and you’ll see that tails are super common and super useful — they propel fish through water, give cows a way to keep flies at bay, and help monkeys swing through forests. So why did humans and other great apes evolve to be tailless? And, specifically, how did we do it?  That question has puzzled scientists for as long as we’ve known that evolution was a thing — and researchers at NYU just got us a major step closer to answering it. 25 million years ago: Past research has found that more than 100 genes play a role in tail development in vertebrates, and lead study author Bo Xia had a hunch that a mutation in one of them set human and ape ancestors on the path to taillessness, some 25 million years ago. It takes TWO to make an impact! Bo Xia In search of that mutation, he compared the genomes of humans and five other species of apes to those of 15 species of monkeys with tails. This led to the discovery that …