Human DNA is not always making us function in ways we understand. Some of our genome is just there, and we’re not sure what it does. In fact, 8% of our DNA are viruses our ancestors caught one day and ...

The story of life’s beginnings gets stranger when you look closely at viruses. These tiny entities seem to sit at the edge of biology. They carry genetic material, but they cannot make proteins on ...

In a new study, published in Cell, researchers describe a newfound mechanism for creating proteins in a giant DNA virus, comparable to a mechanism in eukaryotic cells. The finding challenges the dogma ...

New research reveals that triggering a cell’s DNA damage response could be a promising avenue for developing novel treatments against several rare but devastating viruses for which no antiviral ...

The herpesvirus can manipulate our DNA with far more precision than previously thought. The virus condenses and changes the shape of our genetic material to hijack the host genes needed for ...

The abundance of viral DNA was measured in DNA sequenced from blood and saliva samples in biobanks, revealing strong correlations with age, sex and dozens of genetic variants. Genetic analyses ...

Genetics tools have advanced significantly in recent decades, and have allowed scientist to sequence all of the genetic material they find in any sample. That has enabled researchers to discover giant ...

In the game of survival, you can't always go it alone. Tiny algae living in the harsh conditions of the world's polar oceans appear to be better able to withstand the cold, high salinity, and extreme ...