Genetic Secrets

The dramatic explosion of information brought about by recent advances in genetic research brings welcome scientific knowledge. Yet this new knowledge also raises complex and troubling issues concerning privacy and confidentiality. This thought-provoking book is the first comprehensive exploration of these ethical, legal, and social issues. Distinguished experts in law, medicine, bioethics, public health, science policy, clinical genetics, philosophy, and other fields consider the many contexts in which issues of genetic privacy arise--from research and clinical settings to workplaces, insurance offices, schools, and the courts. The first chapters of this book set out a framework for analyzing genetic privacy and confidentiality, comparing genetic privacy with other forms of medical privacy. Later chapters deal with such topics as concerns that arise in the health care setting (the patient-physician relationship, genetic counseling and privacy); the effect of new technology (the role of commercial genomics, forensic DNA applications); nonmedical uses of genetic information (the law of medical and genetic privacy in the workplace, implications of genetic testing for health and life insurance); and a review of ethics and law in the United States and abroad. In the concluding chapter, Mark A. Rothstein discusses flaws in existing and proposed legislation designed to protect genetic privacy and confidentiality, and he offers a new set of guidelines for policy makers.

In this volume, the psychiatrist Robert Klitzman explores how individuals confront the complex issues associated with genetic testing in their daily lives.

Life's Greatest Secret is the story of the discovery and cracking of the genetic code. This great scientific breakthrough has had far-reaching consequences for how we understand ourselves and our place in the natural world. The code forms the most striking proof of Darwin's hypothesis that all organisms are related, holds tremendous promise for improving human well-being, and has transformed the way we think about life. Matthew Cobb interweaves science, biography and anecdote in a book that mixes remarkable insights, theoretical dead-ends and ingenious experiments with the pace of a thriller. He describes cooperation and competition among some of the twentieth century's most outstanding and eccentric minds, moves between biology, physics and chemistry, and shows the part played by computing and cybernetics. The story spans the globe, from Cambridge MA to Cambridge UK, New York to Paris, London to Moscow. It is both thrilling science and a fascinating story about how science is done.

Why do twins look alike? How are we similar to our parents? What is the genetic code? Professor Lin He, an Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, shares his childhood stories and knowledge of genetics in this vividly illustrated popular science book.

This title presents the history of genetics. Vivid text details how early studies of heredity and genes led to our modern understanding of how DNA works. It also puts a spotlight on the brilliant scientists who made these advances possible. Useful sidebars, rich images, and a glossary help readers understand the science and its importance. Maps and diagrams provide context for critical discoveries in the field. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Essential Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

Fifty years ago, James D. Watson, then just twentyfour, helped launch the greatest ongoing scientific quest of our time. Now, with unique authority and sweeping vision, he gives us the first full account of the genetic revolution—from Mendel’s garden to the double helix to the sequencing of the human genome and beyond. Watson’s lively, panoramic narrative begins with the fanciful speculations of the ancients as to why “like begets like” before skipping ahead to 1866, when an Austrian monk named Gregor Mendel first deduced the basic laws of inheritance. But genetics as we recognize it today—with its capacity, both thrilling and sobering, to manipulate the very essence of living things—came into being only with the rise of molecular investigations culminating in the breakthrough discovery of the structure of DNA, for which Watson shared a Nobel prize in 1962. In the DNA molecule’s graceful curves was the key to a whole new science. Having shown that the secret of life is chemical, modern genetics has set mankind off on a journey unimaginable just a few decades ago. Watson provides the general reader with clear explanations of molecular processes and emerging technologies. He shows us how DNA continues to alter our understanding of human origins, and of our identities as groups and as individuals. And with the insight of one who has remained close to every advance in research since the double helix, he reveals how genetics has unleashed a wealth of possibilities to alter the human condition—from genetically modified foods to genetically modified babies—and transformed itself from a domain of pure research into one of big business as well. It is a sometimes topsy-turvy world full of great minds and great egos, driven by ambitions to improve the human condition as well as to improve investment portfolios, a world vividly captured in these pages. Facing a future of choices and social and ethical implications of which we dare not remain uninformed, we could have no better guide than James Watson, who leads us with the same bravura storytelling that made The Double Helix one of the most successful books on science ever published. Infused with a scientist’s awe at nature’s marvels and a humanist’s profound sympathies, DNA is destined to become the classic telling of the defining scientific saga of our age.

In the fifty years since DNA was discovered, we have seen extraordinary advances. For example, genetic testing has rapidly improved the diagnosis and treatment of diseases such as Huntington's, cystic fibrosis, breast cancer, and Alzheimer's. But with this new knowledge comes difficult decisions for countless people, who wrestle with fear about whether to get tested, and if so, what to do with the results. Am I My Genes? shows how real individuals have confronted these issues in their daily lives. Robert L. Klitzman interviewed 64 people who faced Huntington's Disease, breast and ovarian cancer, or Alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency. The book describes--often in the person's own words--how each has wrestled with the vast implications that genetics has for their lives and their families. Klitzman shows how these men and women struggle to make sense of their predicament and its causes. They confront a series of quandaries--whether to be tested; whether to disclose their genetic risks to parents, siblings, spouses, offspring, friends, doctors, insurers, employers, and schools; how to view and understand themselves and their genetics; what treatments, if any, to pursue; whether to have children, adopt, screen embryos, or abort; and whether to participate in genetic communities. In the face of these uncertainties, they have tried to understand these tests and probabilities, avoid fatalism, anxiety, despair, and discrimination, and find hope, meaning, and a sense of wholeness. Forced to wander through a wilderness of shifting sands, they chart paths that many others may eventually follow. Klitzman captures here the voices of pioneers, some of the first to encounter the personal dilemmas introduced by modern genetics. Am I My Genes? is an invaluable account of their experience, one that will become all the more common in the coming years. "An extraordinary exploration...probing the many roles and implications of genetics in our lives today.... Filled with astonishing insights, this riveting book is vital reading for us all." --Paula Zahn "Klitzman lucidly discusses the moral and psychological complexities that come in the wake of genetic testing.... An important book for anyone who has the genes for pathology, which is all of us, and I recommend it highly." --Kay Redfield Jamison, author of An Unquiet Mind "An illuminating voyage through the medical, familial and existential quandaries faced by those of us at genetic risk." --Thomas H. Murray, President and CEO, The Hastings Center

An illustrated introduction to genetics. The Secret Life of Genes is the story of genetic science and how it makes each of us unique. It spans the discovery of the gene and the all-encompassing role it plays in biology: from controlling the inner workings of cells and the development of embryos, through patterns of inheritance, to the evolution of new forms of life. From there developed the vast and boundless field of genetic science and research. Readers will get a sneak peek into the Human Genome Project, the international scientific research project with the goal of determining the sequence of nucleotide base pairs that make up human DNA. From this, scientists identified and mapped all of the genes of the human genome from both a physical and a functional standpoint, and opened a Pandora's box of secrets: the hidden workings of the human genome; how gene switching, junk DNA, and genetic mutation might be affecting our everyday lives; and why patents are soaring for genetic inventions. The Secret Life of Genes is written in accessible language and organized for easy comprehension. It opens with the basics and the key theories, goes on to describe DNA sequencing and what we can do with it. It then looks at the history of the world's DNA and gives readers an exciting glimpse of the future of the field.