Epigenetics

In Fish, Parents’ Stressful Experiences Influence Offspring Behavior Via Epigenetic Changes

A parent’s or grandparent’s stressful experiences change how their offspring behave. And it turns out that moms’ experiences produce different changes in kids than dads’.

The Conversation

Ancient DNA Puts a Face on the Mysterious Denisovans, Extinct Cousins of Neanderthals

Until now, even scientists could only guess at the features of the extinct Denisovans, who once thrived across Asia.

Science

The Explosive Science of Epigenetics

The health choices you make today could affect the expression of your kids’ (and grandkids’) DNA — and maybe their risk for disease.

Elemental, Medium

Parents’ Emotional Trauma May Change Their Children’s Biology. Studies In Mice Show How

Researchers are studying mice to pin down just how trauma might affect an individual’s biological legacy.

Science

Parents’ ‘Memory’ of Environmental Stress Inherited Across Generations

While actual memories aren’t passed along to offspring, new research suggests the genetic effects of environmental stressors experienced by parents can be inherited across generations.

UPI

Wings May All Be Universal. Smarts, Not So Much

Many astrobiologists believe life gets going easily on Earthlike planets and so will be widespread in the universe. It is then possible that some of those planets might have evolved intelligent beings.

Cosmos

Can We Really Inherit Trauma?

Headlines suggest that the genetic marks of trauma can be passed from one generation to the next. But the evidence, at least in humans, is circumstantial at best.

The New York Times

Inherited Trauma Shapes Your Health

A new study on Civil War prisoners adds to the evidence suggesting that our parents’ — and even grandparents’ — experiences might affect our DNA.

The Atlantic

Epigenetics and Evolution

An interview with Michael Skinner, founder and director of the Washington State University and University of Idaho Center for Reproductive Biology.

Your Own Health And Fitness, KPFA

Beyond Epigenetics

A pair of evolutionary biologists takes a closer look at nongenetic inheritance.

Science

Can a Parent’s Life Experience Change the Genes a Child Inherits?

Inside the controversial world of epigenetics research.

The Atlantic

Evolution Unleashed

Is evolutionary science due for a major overhaul — or is talk of ‘revolution’ misguided?

Aeon

Uncertain Inheritance: Epigenetics and the Poisoning of Michigan

In 1973, a toxic chemical was mixed into tons of farm feed, sickening livestock and exposing millions of Michiganders. Should later generations worry?

Undark

Scientists, Theologians Ponder If Latest Biological Findings Are More Compatible With Religion

Exciting progress in biology in recent decades may be building up a third new phase in the scientific explanation of life, according to thinkers gathered at a University of Oxford conference.

Religion News Service

Finding the Actions That Alter Evolution

The biologist Marcus Feldman creates mathematical models that reveal how cultural traditions can affect the evolution of a species.

Quanta Magazine

Shifting the Genetic Paradigm with Epigenetics

Michael Skinner hopes his research will lead to medical tests that could determine which environmental factors our ancestors might have been exposed to.

AAAS