Unbroken news: non-invasive prenatal testing

I know what they say about yesterday's news and today's fish and chip paper but what I'm about to tell you is six months old and still a little way off as a headline... [Read More]

Gene therapy trials for heart failure launched

Gene therapy will be used to treat heart failure for the first time in the UK, in clinical trials being launched by the British Heart Foundation... [Read More]

Crick Cambridge college commemoration

A memorial to Francis Crick has been unveiled at his former college at the University of Cambridge to mark the 60th anniversary of the publication of the structure of DNA... [Read More]

Book Review: A Matter of Life - The Story of IVF, A Medical Breakthrough

In the UK, around one in six couples has difficulty conceiving, and it is this desire to have children that drove two awe-inspiring men – Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe – to work together to perfect a technique known as IVF... [Read More]

Just five patients but gene therapy leukaemia trial yields positive results

Early results of an experimental gene therapy against an aggressive form of leukaemia have been hailed by researchers as showing 'life saving potential'.... [Read More]

Public in favour of allowing mitochondrial replacement, says UK regulator

Mitochondrial replacement therapy, where a small amount of a mother's genetic material is swapped with material from a donor during IVF to avoid passing on heritable illnesses, enjoys the 'general support' of the public, the UK's fertility regulator says... [Read More]

Stem cell-like origins of ovarian cancer identified

The source of stem cell-like cells that can give rise to ovarian cancer in mice has been found, reports a study in the journal Nature... [Read More]

Book Review: Transhumanist Dreams and Dystopian Nightmares

Perhaps fortuitously, I started to read Maxwell Mehlman's book at the same time as Roy Porter's 'A short history of madness'. It was then difficult not to muse on what Jonathan Swift might have made of 'transhumanising scientists'... [Read More]

Reduced DNA egg repair may explain age-related fertility fall-off

A slowdown in DNA repair mechanisms, one of which involves the BRCA genes implicated in cancer, may partly explain why women's eggs rapidly decline in both quantity and quality in middle age... [Read More]

Immune cells made resistant to HIV

Altering the genetic makeup of immune cells could provide them with resistance to HIV... [Read More]

Biotechnology, choice and the public good

How valuable are emerging biotechnologies? Of all the questions about the prospects of the life sciences, this is the one that UK policy makers seem most eager to answer... [Read More]

Immune cell gene therapy a success for one leukaemia patient

A seven-year-old girl with a highly aggressive form of leukaemia may have been 'cured' by an experimental therapy that harnesses the body's immune system to seek out and destroy the disease.... [Read More]

Event Review: Have Your Say on Mitochondria Replacement (Manchester)

Under the law as it stands in the UK, only 'permitted' embryos may be implanted into a woman. Permitted embryos are those that have not been genetically modified, and are not formed from genetically modified gametes... [Read More]

What Gurdon and Yamanaka's Nobel Prize means to the stem cell community

It took 50 years for the Nobel committee to acknowledge one of the key developments in biology... [Read More]

Freeing us from our cells: avoiding inherited mitochondrial disease

On 25 September 2012 the Progress Educational Trust held a debate on the issues surrounding new techniques to prevent the transmission of mitochondrial disease. The event was organised in partnership with City University London's science journalism course and was supported by the Wellcome Trust.... [Read More]

Mouse studies suggest fresh approach to fertility preservation

Two proteins that kick-start the destruction of damaged mouse eggs have been discovered by scientists. The findings may go on to have applications in fertility preservation for female cancer patients who receive aggressive treatment... [Read More]

Radio Review: The Reunion - Dolly the Sheep

In February 1997, sheep 6LL3 made global front page news. Better known as 'Dolly', she was the first mammal successfully cloned from an adult cell... [Read More]

Rare form of autism treated with dietary supplement

A rare form of autism, caused by a mutation that alters amino acid metabolism, could potentially be treated with a nutritional supplement, according to an international team of researchers... [Read More]

Book Review: Tissue Culture in Science and Society - The Public Life of a Biological Technique in Twentieth Century Britain

Duncan Wilson begins this book by expressing hope that highlighting the historical interactions between the scientific and social worlds of tissue culture will provide current debates with some much needed balance and perspective. In this, he succeeds admirably... [Read More]

Stem cells responsible for 'thinking' brain cells identified

Scientists have identified a sub-type of stem cell responsible for neuron development within the cerebral cortex associated with higher level brain function... [Read More]