In 2013, farmers in the highlands of Ethiopia began to notice something unsettling: a familiar variety of wheat was failing in an unfamiliar way. Stems weakened, plants collapsed, and fields that had once held firm against disease were suddenly vulnerable.

A study published today in the journal Science reveals how jumping fragments of human DNA, a type of genetic parasite, destabilise the cancer genome. Unstable genomes are a fertile playground for cancer evolution,

“Our analyses show that the historical [human Rhinovirus] A genome represents an extinct lineage closely related to HRV A19 and suggests a dynamic turnover of [human Rhinovirus] A genotypes”, the team write.

For decades, scientists believed a fertilized egg’s DNA began as a shapeless mass, only organizing itself once the embryo switched on its genes. But new research reveals that the genome is already carefully arranged in three dimensions long before that critical activation step,

Most people alive today carry fragments of Neanderthal DNA in their genome. Now scientists are gaining a more intimate understanding of the ancient encounters that put it there.

LINE-1 retrotransposons are mobile genome parasites that drive cancer evolution by reshuffling the host genome.

For years, geneticists have wrestled with a curious absence: many modern people carry Neanderthal DNA, yet large stretches of the human X chromosome are almost empty of it. A new study argues that this pattern may not be a story of “bad” genes being purged,

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Presumed portrait of Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), by an Unknown Artist. The painting hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. Scientists are one step closer to pinpointing ...

Even though farmers have been dealing with rice stink bugs as pests since the 1880s, entomologists are still getting to know them at the genetic level. A first-of-its-kind study published on the genetics of rice stink bugs offers clues that could shape the battlefront on insecticide resistance for a tiny creature that costs Arkansas farmers millions of dollars a year.