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There seems to be one surefire way to increase longevity in animals. It's caloric restriction, which means placing them on a near-starvation diet. We don't know if that could work on humans... but fruit flies might be able to give us the answer. More »
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Our genes don't just help determine who we are — they also preserve an incredibly ancient record of who our ancestors were. Our genomes can actually reveal human population sizes dating all the way back to before humans even existed. More »
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In the United States alone, 20 million people suffer from peripheral neuropathy, a condition that involves nerve degeneration and sometimes extreme pain, often without any explanation. Now we've found the culprit for this mysterious pain...and it's all one gene's fault. More »
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The water flea species Daphnia pulex is barely more than a millimeter long, is completely translucent, has no clear divisions between their various body parts...and has the largest genome of any animal we've ever encountered. It has an incredible 31,000 genes in its genome, over 8,000 more than humans have. So what's such a tiny organism doing with such a huge amount of genes? More »
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Your friends might seem like an essentially random bunch, based on shared interests and emotional compatibility. But there might be something genetic going on - and it's related to how much you drink. More »
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Is your political outlook in your genes? Researchers have identified a gene variant that could predispose adolescents to becoming liberal adults — but only if they have an active social life. More »
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Buffy and Angel veteran Tim Minear may be in talks to head a revival of Gene Roddenberry's The Questor Tapes, but don't expect it to be a Whedonesque re-do, according to the man responsible for the property, Rod Roddenberry. More »
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Know someone who seems congenitally incapable of driving? A new study suggests that a genetic variant may, in fact, be responsible for poor driving skills — and it's a variant nearly one third of Americans possess. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5392005&view=rss&microfeed=true "Science Fiction has become an exclusively literary genre, with books inspired less by new scientific research than by previous science fiction books, and, regrettably, movies. Ideas turn into tropes, and instead of extrapolation, we get variation: of the generation star ship, the space alien, the artificial brain, the parallel universe. More »
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The idea of making personal genetic information public evokes images of genomic Google searches and gene-testing job interviews straight out of Gattaca. But there are many who believe genetic openness could go a long way toward advancing disease research. Tomorrow, ten volunteers will take the first steps away from genetic privacy, allowing their personal genetic information to be posted online without the veil of anonymity. More »
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Ever wonder what drives some people to every splatter fest that reaches the theater, while others flee the room any time a zombie flashes on the television? Researchers at the University of Bonn have discovered that a gene may be responsible for your fear of monster movies. Click through for more on the study, and the evolutionary benefits of the heebie jeebies. More »
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