All Roads Once Led to Rome… But Do All Roads Lead to Autism??
Even though, at face value, cancer and autism may seem like worlds apart, if you take a look at their respective genetics you may find more similarities than you bargained […]
Tag Archives: DNA
A Few Tidbits about Epigenetics: The Methylome
The Methylome is a new toy of genetic science. It adds yet another level of complexity “above genetics”, responsible for affecting patterns of gene expression and, relevant to my line […]
Our Latest Study: The Link between Mobile Element Content and Autism-risk Genes
“An extremely large number of genes have been associated with autism. The functions of these genes span numerous domains and prove challenging in the search for commonalities underlying the conditions. […]
Responses to the ENCODE Project: When Scientists Have to Deal with Beetles in Boxes
How is the word “function” like a beetle in a box? No, this isn’t a twist on the Mad Hatter’s “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” As I’ve […]
Mutations on the Brain!!!
I’ve talked a lot about DNA mutations, transposons and retrotransposons, microsatellite repeat sequences in cancer and autism, and even somatic mosaicism on this blog. But I haven’t really talked about […]
A Little Cancer in All of Us
Cancer. The thought of it can be absolutely terrifying. Moreso than heart disease, stroke, or Alzheimer’s. Maybe because its diagnosis often seems so out of the blue, or because we […]
Is Eukaryotic DNA Still Living in a Prokaryotic World? How Changing Our Labels Can Change the Way We Think about Genetics
A “housekeeping” gene is a gene which is constitutively or constantly expressed and is necessary for basic cellular functions. “Contingency” genes, on the other hand, produce gene products which are, […]
The Bionic Cell: How Metal Ions Make the Cellular World Go Round
Metal ions. DNA just doesn’t work right without them. Or much of biology for that matter. Back in the 1980s, Graham Cairns-Smith postulated that, rather than nucleic acids forming the […]
Lazy Science: Can the Life Sciences Handle All This “Big Data”?
There was a recent article in The New Yorker titled, “Steamrolled by Big Data,” which reminded me of the trend occurring now in the Life Sciences. Even though, unlike Google, […]
The Forgotten Intron…
Let’s face it. Exons get all the glory. They’re the star players of the game, the quarterbacks, the offensive line. Meanwhile, introns and other intergenic regions play a more defensive […]
Science Over a Cuppa 
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