Scientists may be able to add capabilities gradually instead of rebuilding life's operating system all at once.

The genetic code is the recipe for life, and provides the instructions for how to make proteins, generally using just 20 amino acids. But certain groups of microbes have an expanded genetic code, in ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Recent breakthroughs in genetics research may have uncovered new genes underlying common psychiatric disorders. Schizophrenia and ...

Nearly all living organisms use the same genetic code, a complicated mechanism by which genetic information is translated into proteins, the building blocks of life. A new study suggests conventional ...

Genes are the building blocks of life, and the genetic code provides the instructions for the complex processes that make organisms function. But how and why did it come to be the way it is? "We find ...

For many years, scientists have known that genetic variants, or differences in DNA code across people, play some role in neurological and psychiatric disorders. But the details were murky. Now, ...

Autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is the most common inherited cause of kidney failure. Despite decades of ...

A team from the University of Illinois has uncovered surprising evolutionary links between the genetic code and tiny protein fragments called dipeptides. By analyzing billions of dipeptide sequences ...

Scientists have found new genetic causes for diabetes in babies—in a part of the genome that has historically been overlooked in genetic studies. Until recently, most research has investigated causes ...