Human genome

company that last summer secured more than $100 million in hope to create the first “app store” for genetic information. Helix is a bet to the buyout firm Warburg Pincus, and Illumina, the leading manufacturer of ultrafast DNA sequencing machines. Genomes hold information about…

Deoxyribonucleic Acid is the molecule within human cells that holds all our genetic material (Genetics Home Reference, 2017). DNA can be found in all cells of the body except red blood cells and can be collected from hair follicles, blood, skin, bodily fluids, bone marrow, tissues etc (GHR, 2017). In criminal cases, DNA is used as evidence to prove whether a person was connected with a crime. If a person’s DNA is found at a crime scene, they become a suspect in an investigation. The use of DNA…

got one step closer as scientists in China have successfully modified the genes of a human embryo. This news reverberated throughout the scientific community and hailed as the next revolution of medicine as it will allow us to eradicate devastating genetic illnesses such as Down syndrome, Anemia and Parkinson’s (Tarantola). As the name indicates, genetically engineering embryos is the manipulation of the human genome, in order to improve the embryo’s DNA, and subsequently prevent devastating…

Human Genetic Engineering: A Hero Discovery or a Society Divider? In 1997, the film Gattaca was created, which showed the public a futuristic idea of humans being able to edit and modify human genes to create “valid” humans as well as “invalids”. Today, this futuristic idea from 19 years ago has become a not so out of reach reality for society today. Human genetic engineering is the process of either adding improved DNA or deleting sections of a person’s DNA and then adding more efficient DNA in…

The video I reflected on was “Cracking Your Genetic Code”. The documentary begins talking about a flash drive that contains a person’s genetic code. There are 6 billion letters in it and we could have a chance to see genome sequence for $1,000. But there are some ups and downs about it. Some people think it’s invasive because even insurance companies could look at it. But it could predict cancer. This could affect one’s life forever. How well do you want to know yourself? Genomics is almost…

In the case of many elite athletes, there is actually scientific basis for the phrase “natural born talent”, at least to some degree. The increased interest and research opportunity in genetics since the latter twentieth century naturally sparked research within the sport science community in discovering how gene expression correlates to athletic ability. Though countless factors help to determine an athlete’s abilities, genes can play a role in athletic performance. Some of the pertinent…

Introduction: Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is known to be the most common cause of inherited mental retardation and autism and is the second most common cause of genetically associated mental deficiencies, after Down syndrome. It is a trinucleotide repeat disorder resulting from an expansion in a CGG repeat in the region of the fragile X mental retardation-1 gene (FMR1) on the X chromosome (more than 200 repeats were found in the full mutation, while the normal number of repeats is 6–54 repeats).…

biology of today and generated new insights into genetic coding upon which today’s multi-billion dollar biotechnology industry is founded. It laid the groundwork for other scientific achievements, including modern forensics and the mapping of the human genome. All of this is thanks to Watson and Crick, and their groundbreaking discovery of “the master molecule of life” (Dahm, 2011, p. 327). Genetics Before the Discovery Before Watson and Crick’s breakthrough, in the early 1950’s, scientists…

The article Brave New Genome is very interesting and raises some very good questions regarding bioethical issues. The articles introduces the topic by giving a brief timeline of events that have taken place in genome mapping over the years. One of the biggest discoveries occurred about ten years ago and scientists found that bacteria cells can be programmed to use DNA to reproduce specific types of genomes. Then in 2013 a scientists Zhang and Church were able to use this information and apply it…

Huntington disease (HD) is a neurodegenerative disorder affecting 1 in every 10,000 individuals (Halpin, 2011). Genetic predictive testing is a good option for at-risk individuals to know if they will develop the disease. Therefore in this paper, I will discuss HD genetic testing advancements, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of the test. HD is an inherited neurological disorder that results in involuntary movements as well as cognitive and psychiatric disturbances (Warby et al.,…