Early hominids may have behaved more 'human' than we had thought
...valuable to these early ancestors and has become a trait among humans," he said. Paleontologists knew that there were minimal size differences between males and females since Homo sapiens evolved but the fossil record is s...Common nutrients fed to pregnant mice altered their offspring's coat color
...e to epigenetic changes because of an evolutionary trait in which "junk" remnants of viral infections, called "transposons," inserted themselves randomly within the human and animal genomes. Transposons use the gene replication machinery to reproduce themselves. Cells use methylation as a means to inactiva...Gene helps regulate longevity in flies, and perhaps humans
...eractive, the effect of a single gene on a complex trait may be marginal," said Mackay. "But it's not impossible to foresee future pharmacological interventions that could improve the quality of life of the aging population."...UC Riversides Derek Roff says global warming may threaten endangered species
... Roff writes: The authors have studied a single trait that apparently lacks genetic variation in the fru...fman et al. appear exceptional, but given that the trait involved is likely to be under selection generated by global warming, there is an obvious need to as...Study results show promise for development of gene therapy to treat blood diseases
...lion people in the United States carry the genetic trait for thalassemia. For this reason, the National Institutes of Health recommend that all US citizens should be tested for the thalassemia trait....Reducing the risk of frost damage to short-season crops
...k of frost damage and this is an important variety trait for soybeans grown in areas with short growing seasons. Flowering time in soybeans is controlled by day length. Soybean plants will flower early during short days and will flower late during the long days of summer. Previous research has indicated t...Essential gene for male fertility found
... cause of spontaneous miscarriages in humans and a trait in many human cancer cells. Penninger says their research suggests that a protein produced by the Fkbp6 gene is a critical molecule for the proper pairing of chromosomes and that other Fkbp6 family proteins may also play a role in controlling the pai...Finicky snails provide new clues to the evolution of coastal ecosystems
... this culinary preference is probably an inherited trait - the result of generations of genetic and geographic isolation along the shores of the Pacific. The discovery of finicky snail populations on the Oregon and Washington coast could have profound implications for managing marine ecosystems worldwide, ...The roots of human behavior? AAAS and The Hastings Center host a public meeting
...ward becoming naval officers (supposedly a genetic trait called thalassophilia, for "love of the sea."), to...ts. First, we should recognize that just because a trait is genetic doesn't mean that we are powerless to intervene with corrective or ameliorative strategie...Biotech regulations impede crop domestication
...t that never would have naturally contained such a trait for instance, a gene for herbicide resistance into a corn plant. The advent of inexpensive genomic mapping has opened many new doors, he said. "Now, it's much more possible to take different genetic characteristics of a grain crop, for instance, an...Redheaded women respond better to painkilling drug
...ly in women. Using a technique called quantitative trait locus mapping, Mogil and his colleagues identified a candidate gene that may be responsible for this sex difference. Interestingly, the gene, called Mc1r, was first associated, not with neurological function, but with pigmentation. Variants of the ge...OHSU researchers discover brain cell mechanism possibly linked to mental retardation
...searcher on this project, also noted an unexpected trait found in mice lacking the WAVE-1 protein reduced ... and Raber labs will try to determine whether this trait is also found in humans with the corresponding form of mental retardation....iScope, you scope, we all scope a mouse brain
...ecific genes of interest are QTLs, or quantitative trait loci, which indicate an individuals susceptibility to certain diseasesa blurry combination of the effects of both quantitative and qualitative traits. Along with the projects computer programs, researchers may obtain free stereology software, which ...Symposium on how 'nature and nurture' impact child development
...s to influence whether a particular psychological trait (and underlying neurobiologic substrates) will be expressed in genetically predisposed individuals. For example in animal cross-fostering studies offspring with a genetic predisposition to fearfulness will be less fearful if raised by highly nurturi......ng a key question in evolutionary biology: Did the trait of vocal learning emerge independently in all six vocal-learning groups within the past 65 million years, as a now-dominant theory suggests? Or, did all vocal learners share a common ancestor with the trait, but then diverge as a result of subsequent...Genetics, genes and intelligence
...ter M6 8HD, UK General intelligence is a heritable trait that is a risk factor for both the onset of dement...rsons. Previous studies screening for quantitative trait loci (QTLs) that influence general intelligence in healthy individuals have identified four loci, tw...New genetic 'fishing net' harvests elusive autism gene
...ith changes to their daily routine. This character trait -- defined by Cuccaro as "insistence on sameness" or "IS" -- helped the research team identify a subset of autism family data to study in more detail. Researchers, led by Yujun Shao, Ph.D., a genetic epidemiologist at Duke, reorganized data collecte...Essay on genes and behavior prompts culture clash in academic journal
...hat would respond to selection by the breeder on a trait such as fat content in milk or egg production in chickens.'' The definition of heritability was later broadened to accommodate the fact that genes and environments sometimes interact in ways that cannot be estimated or controlled. Unfortunately, note...Researchers decipher cause of parasites worldwide spread
...g tissue cysts is seen only in Toxoplasma and this trait is exemplified by these young strains," says Sibley. "This strongly suggests that the unique combination of genes passed along during that one mating event endowed the three young strains with an ability to more effectively spread throughout the food...Search for cholesterol absorption genes narrows to two chromosome regions
...hundreds of mice in an attempt to link an observed trait to the genes that cause it. One experiment can tak...laboratory mice possessing opposite varieties of a trait of interest. Sehayek and colleagues began by mating a strain of mice they discovered to have low pla...