Author: Matt Kristoffersen
Greetings–
Sorry to be sending out this week’s issue of Friday’s Elk on a Saturday. I blame writing. I’m starting on the first draft of my next book, and I was having so much fun spending a day of uninterrupted writing that I forgot about everything else.
Better late than never, here are a couple new items for you to read. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, December 4, 2015 (The better late than ever edition)”
Greetings–
Happy Thanksgiving! In honor of the turkey fest, here’s a breifer-than-usual Friday’s Elk this week.
Europe Evolving
–This week in the New York Times, I reported about a study of 230 genomes retrieved from European skeletons ranging from 8,500 to 2,300 years in age. They create a chronicle of human evolution, documenting how the agricultural revolution altered the genetic landscape of a continent. Check it out. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, November 27, 2015”
Greetings–
Here’s the week that was…
Denisovans and Other Mysterious Humans
–Ancient DNA continues to illuminate our family tree. In 2010, I wrote about mysterious ancient relatives of Neanderthals called Denisovans, which scientists only knew from a tooth, a fingerbone, and the 50,000-year-old DNA they contained. Now scientists have found some new Denisovan DNA in a tooth, and the broadening picture we’re getting is fascinating. Yet in some ways, the enigma of the Denisovans is only getting deeper. I wrote about the mystery in The New York Times this week. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, November 20, 2015”
Greetings–
On this Friday the 13th, I wish you only good luck and offer you the following diversions…
The DNA of a Million Veterans
–I’ve got a new story at STAT, about the next chapter in the history of genetics. Researchers are launching massive studies of huge numbers of people in order to link genes to diseases. One of the biggest is being run by the U.S. military. The Veterans Administration is gathering the DNA of a million veterans to study everything from diabetes to PTSD. I went inside the Million Veteran Program to get a first-hand look at this new way of exploring our genes. (Be sure to check out the video of the enormous operation!) Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, November 13, 2015”
STAT, November 11, 2015
“This is our brand new freezer,” Don Humphries said. “It holds 4 million vials.”
You’d think a freezer big enough to hold 4 million vials of blood would be easy to spot. But to my great embarrassment, I couldn’t see it.
Humphries and I were standing in a lab in the basement of the Veterans Affairs hospital in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston. He had led me through a labyrinth of windowless rooms, packed with robots handling tubes of blood donated from veterans, pipes roaring with coolant, and gorilla-sized tanks of liquid nitrogen, until he stopped next to a featureless wall.