It was only a small meeting – by the standards of scientific symposia – barely 50 participants in one of the smaller lecture rooms donated for the purpose by the Royal College of Psychiatrists in London. But, as Randy Nesse pointed out, it was a miracle...
Kelly Robinson and Julie Dunning Hotopp share a lab in the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore, and jointly research the role of bacterial lateral gene transfer in human disease. We’re used to human evolution putting imported viral genes to...
There’s an interesting editorial on autism in PLoS Biology, written by PLoS staffer Liza Gross. She looks at several papers on the possible origins of autism that have come out since the disastrous effect on vaccination caused by the irresponsible publication of...
Back in 1962, James Neel proposed the “thrifty-gene” hypothesis to explain rising epidemics of metabolic syndrome – obesity and its closely associated co-morbidities – throughout the western world. This suggested that, since obesity has a strong genetic...
One form of eczema, atopic dermatitis, results in very unpleasant itchy, red, scaly rashes often over large parts of the body. Blistering can occur and splitting of the skin, which can exude and leaves the skin open to infection. The genetic cause of eczema has just...
