Genetics – Lifeboat News: The Blog

Oct 12
2022

What fundamentally sets a human being apart from every other living creature comes down to differences in DNA sequences—

A set of genetically-inherited molecules found in every cell of every organism. These differences have …

Oct 11
2022

Poliovirus found in Brooklyn and Queens sewage, New York health officials say

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has extended the state of emergency declared in response to the spread of poliovirus after sewage tested positive in Brooklyn and Queens.

Hochul said the state disaster emergency will remain in place at least through Nov. 8 to support statewide efforts to boost the vaccination rate against polio.

The New York State Department of Health, in a statement Tuesday, said the sewage sample that tested positive in Brooklyn and Queens is genetically linked to the virus that paralyzed an unvaccinated adult in Rockland County over the summer.

Oct 11
2022

Scientists ‘Blown Away’

The brain’s ability to adapt and rewire itself throughout life continues to surprise neuroscientists. Researchers have found a way to restore sight in adult mice with a form of congenital blindness, in spite of the rodents’ relative maturity.

The mice were modeling a rare human disorder of the eye’s retina, called leber congenital amaurosis (LCA), which often causes blindness or severe visual impairment at birth.

This inherited condition seems to be caused by a mutation in any one of dozens of genes associated with the retina and its light-sensing abilities.

Oct 11
2022

Genetics plays less of a role than age in our health as we get older

A new study shows which factor plays a bigger role as we age.

There are many elements that determine how we age. This includes our genetics, the environment, and our age itself. But what key component has the most profound impact on aging?

According to a new study by researchers at the University of California — Berkeley, aging and the environment play more of a key role in determining our health in later years, than genetics. The study was published in the journal Nature Communications.

Aging affects health more than genes.

Genetics DNA

According to a new study by researchers at the University of California – Berkeley, aging and the environment play more of a key role in determining our health in later years, than genetics. The study was published in the journal Nature Communications.

Continue reading “Genetics plays less of a role than age in our health as we get older” | >

Oct 11
2022

2021’s Breakthroughs in Neuroscience and Other Biology

A paradigm shift in how we think about the functions of the human brain. A long-awaited genetic sequence of Rafflesia arnoldii, the strangest flower in the world. A revelation in sleep science. These are some of the year’s biggest discoveries in neuroscience and other areas of biology. Read the articles in full at Quanta: https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-year-in-biology-20211221/

Quanta Magazine is an editorially independent publication supported by the Simons Foundation.

Oct 11
2022

Team develops method to increase gene editing efficiency while minimizing DNA deletion sizes

Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine (WFIRM) scientists working on CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene editing technology have developed a method to increase efficiency of editing while minimizing DNA deletion sizes, a key step toward developing gene editing therapies to treat genetic diseases.

CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) technology is used to alter DNA sequences and modify gene function. CRISPR/Cas9 is an enzyme that is used like a pair of scissors to cut two strands of DNA at a specific location to add, remove or repair bits of DNA. By modifying gene function, scientists hope to treat genetic diseases by halting a diseased cell’s ability to continue replicating the defective DNA. CRISPR/Cas9 is the most versatile genetic manipulation available and has a wide range of potential applications. While CRISPR/Cas9 mainly generates short insertions or deletions at the target site, it may also make large DNA deletions around the specific target site. These large deletions cause safety concerns and may decrease functional editing efficiency.

The WFIRM team is looking for ways to reduce the chances of this happening. The research described in their recent paper, published recently in Nucleic Acids Research, sought to address the generation of unpredictable on-target long DNA deletions and find a way to guard against them, said lead author Baisong Lu, Ph.D., of WFIRM.

Oct 10
2022

Aging, Environment and Genetics: Which Is More Important for Regulating Gene Expression?

Amid much speculation and research about how our genetics affect the way we age, a University of California, Berkeley, study now shows that individual differences in our DNA matter less as we get older and become prone to diseases of aging, such as diabetes and cancer.

In a study of the relative effects of genetics, aging and the environment on how some 20,000 human genes are expressed, the researchers found that aging and environment are far more important than genetic variation in affecting the expression profiles of many of our genes as we get older. The level at which genes are expressed — that is, ratcheted up or down in activity — determines everything from our hormone levels and metabolism to the mobilization of enzymes that repair the body.

“How do your genetics — what you got from your sperm donor and your egg donor and your evolutionary history — influence who you are, your phenotype, such as your height, your weight, whether or not you have heart disease?” said Peter Sudmant, UC Berkeley assistant professor of integrative biology and a member of the campus’s Center for Computational Biology. “There’s been a huge amount of work done in human genetics to understand how genes are turned on and off by human genetic variation. Our project came about by asking, ‘How is that influenced by an individual’s age?’ And the first result we found was that your genetics actually matter less the older you get.”

Oct 9
2022

Combination of Rapamycin and Acarbose Extends Lifespan

28 to 34% lifespan increase in mice. I wonder if there would be side effects as a recent study showed Rapamycin and Metformin canceled each other’s side effects.

In a new study published in Aging Cell, researchers have tested several individual drugs and a combination of rapamycin plus acarbose as potential life extension agents in genetically heterogeneous mice [1].

Identification of successful anti-aging interventions is arguably one of the most challenging research problems to date. In addition to the complexity of aging, researchers have to deal with the biological heterogeneity of animals even within the same species and research reproducibility issues due to different experimental designs and approaches.

The National Institute on Aging Interventions Testing Program (ITP) was launched in 2004 with these limitations in mind. It is a peer-reviewed multi-institutional study evaluating potential lifespan-extending agents. The experiments are run in parallel at the Jackson Laboratory; the University of Michigan; and the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio on genetically heterogeneous mice of both sexes.