A gene that regulates the development of roots in vascular plants is also involved in the organ development of liverworts—land plants so old they don't even have proper roots. The Kobe University ...

New findings, published in Nature, help answer the riddle of how vertebrates evolved the diverse array of brain cells that ...

Much of the phenotypic variation that is observed within and between species is the result of differences in gene regulation: specifically when, where and how much the genes are expressed. Given the ...

The human brain's remarkably prolonged development is unique among mammals and is thought to contribute to our advanced learning abilities. Disruptions in this process may explain certain ...

Even after 20 million years of evolutionary separation, two tiny worm species show astonishingly similar patterns in how they turn genes on and off. Scientists mapped every cell s activity during ...

For millennia, evolution has intrigued many great thinkers, prompting questions about how new traits emerge as species adapt over time. Then, attention shifted to natural selection and the inheritance ...

When Richard Dawkins’s first blockbuster book was published half a century ago, few genes had ever been sequenced or studied in detail. Yet the book’s gene-centred view of evolution still has much to ...

The evolution of new genes is not the only way for a species to change. The loss of genes may also lead to adaptations that help species survive, but this idea has not been well studied. Now, ...

The DNA blueprint we carry around with us today has been influenced far more by natural selection than we thought, a massive new study reveals, with gene variants behind red hair and pale skin among ...