Herbert Spencer and the eugenics advocate Francis Galton's interpretation of natural selection as necessarily progressive, leading to supposed advances in intelligence and civilisation, became a justification for colonialism, eugenics, and social Darwinism. For example, in 1940, Konrad Lorenz, in writings that he subsequently disowned, used the theory as a justification for policies of the Nazi state. He wrote "... selection for toughness, heroism, and social utility ... must be accomplished by some human institution, if mankind, in default of selective factors, is not to be ruined by domestication-induced degeneracy.

In February 2001, draft results of the human genome were simultaneously published by Nature and Science with Science publishing the Celera Genomics paper and Nature publishing the publicly funded Human Genome Project. In 2007 Science (together with Nature) received the Prince of Asturias Award for Communications and Humanity. In 2015 Rush D. Holt, Jr., chief executive officer of the AAAS and executive publisher of Science, stated that the journal was becoming increasingly international: "[I]nternationally co-authored papers are now the norm—they represent almost 60 percent of the papers. In 1992, it was slightly less than 20 percent." Former Washington University in St.

In some countries, notably the United States, these tensions between science and religion have fuelled the current creation–evolution controversy, a religious conflict focusing on politics and public education. While other scientific fields such as cosmology and Earth science also conflict with literal interpretations of many religious texts, evolutionary biology experiences significantly more opposition from religious literalists. The teaching of evolution in American secondary school biology classes was uncommon in most of the first half of the 20th century.

Some critics of transhumanism see the old eugenics, social Darwinist, and master race ideologies and programs of the past as warnings of what the promotion of eugenic enhancement technologies might unintentionally encourage. Some fear future "eugenics wars" as the worst-case scenario: the return of coercive state-sponsored genetic discrimination and human rights violations such as compulsory sterilization of persons with genetic defects, the killing of the institutionalized and, specifically, segregation and genocide of races perceived as inferior.

In 2007, Watson said, "I turned against the left wing because they don't like genetics, because genetics implies that sometimes in life we fail because we have bad genes. They want all failure in life to be due to the evil system." In 1990, Watson was appointed as the Head of the Human Genome Project at the National Institutes of Health, a position he held until April 10, 1992. Watson left the Genome Project after conflicts with the new NIH Director, Bernadine Healy. Watson was opposed to Healy's attempts to acquire patents on gene sequences, and any ownership of the "laws of nature."

The modern study of genetics at the level of DNA is known as molecular genetics. In 1972, Walter Fiers and his team were the first to determine the sequence of a gene: that of Bacteriophage MS2 coat protein. The subsequent development of chain-termination DNA sequencing in 1977 by Frederick Sanger improved the efficiency of sequencing and turned it into a routine laboratory tool. An automated version of the Sanger method was used in early phases of the Human Genome Project. The theories developed in the early 20th century to integrate Mendelian genetics with Darwinian evolution are called the modern synthesis, a term introduced by Julian Huxley.

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For example, viruses have been useful in the study of genetics and helped our understanding of the basic mechanisms of molecular genetics, such as DNA replication, transcription, RNA processing, translation, protein transport, and immunology. Geneticists often use viruses as vectors to introduce genes into cells that they are studying. This is useful for making the cell produce a foreign substance, or to study the effect of introducing a new gene into the genome. In similar fashion, virotherapy uses viruses as vectors to treat various diseases, as they can specifically target cells and DNA. It shows promising use in the treatment of cancer and in gene therapy.

In evolution, the most important role of such chromosomal rearrangements may be to accelerate the divergence of a population into new species by making populations less likely to interbreed, thereby preserving genetic differences between these populations. Sequences of DNA that can move about the genome, such as transposons, make up a major fraction of the genetic material of plants and animals, and may have been important in the evolution of genomes. For example, more than a million copies of the Alu sequence are present in the human genome, and these sequences have now been recruited to perform functions such as regulating gene expression.

Haldane was the first to have thought of the genetic basis for human cloning, and the eventual artificial breeding of superior individuals. For this he introduced the terms "clone" and "cloning", modifying the earlier "clon" which had been used in agriculture since the early 20th century (from Greek klon, twig). He introduced the term in his speech on "Biological Possibilities for the Human Species of the Next Ten Thousand Years" at the Ciba Foundation Symposium on Man and his Future in 1963. He said: "It is extremely hopeful that some human cell lines can be grown on a medium of precisely known chemical composition.

The field of behavioural genetics, as founded by Galton, was ultimately undermined by another of Galton's intellectual contributions, the founding of the eugenics movement in 20th century society. The primary idea behind eugenics was to use selective breeding combined with knowledge about the inheritance of behaviour to improve the human species. The eugenics movement was subsequently discredited by scientific corruption and genocidal actions in Nazi Germany. Behavioural genetics was thereby discredited through its association to eugenics. The field once again gained status as a distinct scientific discipline through the publication of early texts on behavioural genetics, such as Calvin S.

Playwright Eugene O'Neill won the Nobel literature prize in 1936; other acclaimed U.S. dramatists include multiple Pulitzer Prize winners Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, and August Wilson. Choreographers Isadora Duncan and Martha Graham helped create modern dance, while George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins were leaders in 20th-century ballet. Although little known at the time, Charles Ives's work of the 1910s established him as the first major U.S. composer in the classical tradition, while experimentalists such as Henry Cowell and John Cage created a distinctive American approach to classical composition.

Watson, the first director of the Human Genome Project, initiated the Ethical, Legal and Social Implications Program (ELSI) which has funded a number of studies into the implications of human genetic engineering (along with a prominent website on the history of eugenics), because: In putting ethics so soon into the genome agenda, I was responding to my own personal fear that all too soon critics of the Genome Project would point out that I was a representative of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory that once housed the controversial Eugenics Record Office.

Crick occasionally expressed his views on eugenics, usually in private letters. For example, Crick advocated a form of positive eugenics in which wealthy parents would be encouraged to have more children. He once remarked, "In the long run, it is unavoidable that society will begin to worry about the character of the next generation... It is not a subject at the moment which we can tackle easily because people have so many religious beliefs and until we have a more uniform view of ourselves I think it would be risky to try and do anything in the way of eugenics...

The debate on nature and nurture, the race and intelligence controversy, the heritability wars, concerns over the geneticisation of complex human traits, and arguments over the promises and perils of the human genome project all incorporate some element of disagreement over the primacy of the gene. Hogben's attack on that primacy by appeal to the interdependence of nature and nurture has been echoed in each successive dispute. The Lancelot Thomas Hogben papers are held in Special Collections, University of Birmingham.

The potential of embryonic stem cell research, reproductive cloning, and germline engineering are currently being explored. Prenatal diagnosis or preimplantation diagnosis enables testing embryos for diseases or conditions. Cryoconservation of animal genetic resources is a practice in which animal germplasms, such as embryos are collected and stored at low temperatures with the intent of conserving the genetic material. The embryos of Arabidopsis thaliana have been used as a model to understand gene activation, patterning, and organogenesis of seed plants. In regards to research using human embryos, the ethics and legalities of this application continue to be debated.

Genetics home reference. The National Human Genome Research Institute hosts an information center. The Phenomizer – A tool for clinical diagnostics in medical genetics. Phenomizer.

Cloning and stem cell research, although not considered genetic engineering, are closely related and genetic engineering can be used within them. Synthetic biology is an emerging discipline that takes genetic engineering a step further by introducing artificially synthesised material into an organism. Such synthetic DNA as Artificially Expanded Genetic Information System and Hachimoji DNA is made in this new field. Plants, animals or micro organisms that have been changed through genetic engineering are termed genetically modified organisms or GMOs. If genetic material from another species is added to the host, the resulting organism is called transgenic.

Genetic heterogeneity. Heterokaryon. Heterokaryon test. Heteroplasmon. Heteroplasmy. Heterothallic. Heterothallic fungus. Heterotroph. Heterozygosity. Heterozygote. Heterozygous. Heterozygous DNA. Hexaploid. Hfr cell. Human Genome Project. HHMI. His. Histone. HnRNA. Hogness box. Holandric trait. Holoenzyme. Holoprosencephaly. Homeo-box. Homeo-domain. Homeobox. Homeosis. Homogametic sex. Homolog. Homologue. Homology. Homoplasmy. Homothallic. Homothallic fungus. Homozygote. Homozygous. Homozygous gene pair. Hormone. Host range. Hot spot. Housekeeping genes. HUGO. Human gene therapy. Human genetics. Human genome. Human Genome Project. Huntington's disease. Hybrid (biology). Hybrid DNA.

Relationship between religion and science. Stereotypes of Americans. TalkOrigins. Teach the Controversy. Theology of creationism and evolution. Books. An International Union of Biological Sciences Symposium, August 1967. Journals. Web. An International Union of Biological Sciences Symposium, August 1967. Journals. Web. An International Union of Biological Sciences Symposium, August 1967. Journals. Web. An International Union of Biological Sciences Symposium, August 1967. Journals. Web. An International Union of Biological Sciences Symposium, August 1967. Journals. Web. Web. Web. Web. Web. Web. Web.

The history of the discovery of the structure of DNA is a classic example of the elements of the scientific method: in 1950 it was known that genetic inheritance had a mathematical description, starting with the studies of Gregor Mendel, and that DNA contained genetic information (Oswald Avery's transforming principle). But the mechanism of storing genetic information (i.e., genes) in DNA was unclear. Researchers in Bragg's laboratory at Cambridge University made X-ray diffraction pictures of various molecules, starting with crystals of salt, and proceeding to more complicated substances.

Page ii contains quotations by William Whewell and Francis Bacon on the theology of natural laws, harmonising science and religion in accordance with Isaac Newton's belief in a rational God who established a law-abiding cosmos. In the second edition, Darwin added an epigraph from Joseph Butler affirming that God could work through scientific laws as much as through miracles, in a nod to the religious concerns of his oldest friends.

Most cases of Alzheimer's disease do not exhibit autosomal-dominant inheritance and are termed sporadic AD, in which environmental and genetic differences may act as risk factors. The best known genetic risk factor is the inheritance of the ε4 allele of the apolipoprotein E (APOE). Between 40 and 80% of people with AD possess at least one APOEε4 allele. The APOEε4 allele increases the risk of the disease by three times in heterozygotes and by 15 times in homozygotes. Like many human diseases, environmental effects and genetic modifiers result in incomplete penetrance.

In 1993, the IBC was entrusted with the task of preparing an international instrument on the human genome, the Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights, which was adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO in 1997 and endorsed by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1998. The main purpose of this instrument is to protect the human genome from improper manipulations that may endanger the identity and physical integrity of future generations. To this end, it recognizes the human genome as "the heritage of humanity" (Article 1), and declares "contrary to human dignity" practices such as human cloning (Article 11) and germ-line interventions (Article 24).

Nikolai Vavilov (1887–1943): Russian and Soviet botanist and geneticist best known for having identified the centres of origin of cultivated plants. He devoted his life to the study and improvement of wheat, corn, and other cereal crops that sustain the global population. J. Craig Venter (1946–): American biologist and entrepreneur, one of the first researchers to sequence the human genome, and in 2010 the first to create a cell with a synthetic genome. Vladimir Vernadsky (1863–1945): Ukrainian and Soviet mineralogist and geochemist who is considered one of the founders of geochemistry, biogeochemistry, and of radiogeology.