Ruth Saunders was previously a Volunteer Writer at BioNews, having originally joined the publication under the auspices of its writing scheme; and a Volunteer at the charity that publishes BioNews, the Progress Educational Trust (PET). She is currently studying for a PhD at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL), where she also teaches Business Law. Her PhD research focuses on the legal, ethical and social implications of direct-to-consumer genetic testing for common diseases, pharmacogenetics, nutrigenomics and ancestry. Previously she studied Law at QMUL, where she went on to obtain an MA in Medical Law and Ethics. She tweets as @Ruth_Saunders
The standoff between Roche and Illumina, which provides services and equipment for genetic analysis, finally came to an end last week as the Swiss pharmaceuticals giant ended efforts for a hostile takeover bid...
Last week the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) released a POST Note - a guide for MPs and other parliamentarians on science and technology issues - on consumer genetic testing...
A free information resource detailing numerous disease-specific genetic tests that are now available was launched last week by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH)...
Men may not be on the brink of extinction after all, according to a study on the evolution of the human Y chromosome. Previous research has suggested that the Y sex chromosome, carried only by men, is decaying genetically at such a rate that men would become extinct in five million years' time...
In July 2011, the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHSS) announced its plans to improve the rules governing the protection of human subjects in research, after admitting current regulations were 'developed years ago'...
Exposure to increased levels of vitamin D could boost your fertility, a recent study suggests. The findings may also explain why conception rates fall in the winter and peak in the summer in Northern European countries....
Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche has made an unsolicited bid worth $5.7 billion to takeover US DNA sequencing firm Illumina....
Mutations in a single gene could be used to identify breast cancer tumours that can be tackled with cholesterol-lowering statins, a recent study has found. Scientists identified a link between a cholesterol-building mechanism in the body and disorganised cell growth indicative of cancer...
Stem cell injections have been found to slow down the effects of aging in mice. Researchers have developed a stem cell treatment that significantly slows down aging and increases life span in mice with progeria, a rare genetic disease causing advanced aging...
'We are not our genomes'. Lone Frank, the author of 'My Beautiful Genome — Exposing our Genetic Quirks, One Genome at a Time' spoke to BioNews about her latest book, the recent surge in direct-to-consumer genetic tests, the ethical dilemmas they could pose and what we can understand from such tests. As he says, 'genetics is a work in progress'...
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