The origins of millions of tiny proteins in our bodies, previously assumed to be useless, have now been discovered. A study published on February 17 in the journal Molecular Cell describes how these ...

The human genome is made up of 23 pairs of chromosomes, the biological blueprints that make humans … well, human. But it turns out that some of our DNA — about 8% — are the remnants of ancient viruses ...

A genomic atlas of Nematostella vectensis reveals how primitive animals created multiple cell types millions of years ago, ...

The often-mentioned fact that humans and chimpanzees are 99.9 percent identical in their DNA is hard to accept for some people, who can't comprehend how we could share so much of our basic genetic ...

The genetic code acts as life’s instruction manual, telling cells how to build proteins from DNA and RNA. Though it's a marvel of molecular precision, the path it took to evolve remains unclear. Fresh ...

'Random DNA' is naturally active in the one-celled fungi yeast, while such DNA is turned off as its natural state in mammalian cells, despite their having a common ancestor a billion years ago and the ...