While self-report data is a staple of modern psychological studies, they rely on participants accurately self-reporting. Two constructs that impede accurate results are insufficient effort responding and response styles. These constructs share conceptual underpinnings and both utilized to reduce cognitive effort when responding to self-report scales. Little research has extensively explored the relationship of the two constructs. The current study explored the relationship of the two constructs across even-point and odd-point scales, as well as before and after data cleaning procedures. (...) We utilized IRTrees, a statistical method for modeling response styles, to examine the relationship between IER and response styles. To capture the wide range of IER metrics available, we employed several forms of IER assessment in our analyses and generated IER factors based on the type of IER being detected. Our results indicated an overall modest relationship between IER and response styles, which varied depending on the type of IER metric being considered or type of scale being evaluated. As expected, data cleaning also changed the relationships of some of the variables. We posit the difference between the constructs may be the degree of cognitive effort participants are willing to expend. Future research and applications are discussed. (shrink)

The slandering of a firm’s products by competing firms poses significant threats to the victim firm, with the resulting damage often being as harmful as that from product-harm crises. In contrast to a true product-harm crisis, however, this disparagement is based on a false claim or fake news; thus, we call it a pseudo-product-harm crisis. Using a pseudo-product-harm crisis event that involved two competing firms, this research examines how consumer sentiments about the two firms evolved in response to the crisis. (...) Our analyses show that while both firms suffered, the damage to the offending firm was more detrimental, in terms of advertising effectiveness and negative news publicity, than that to the victim firm. Our study indicates that, even apart from ethical concerns, the false claim about the victim firm was not an effective business strategy to increase the offending firm’s performance. (shrink)

The slandering of a firm’s products by competing firms poses significant threats to the victim firm, with the resulting damage often being as harmful as that from product-harm crises. In contrast to a true product-harm crisis, however, this disparagement is based on a false claim or fake news; thus, we call it a pseudo-product-harm crisis. Using a pseudo-product-harm crisis event that involved two competing firms, this research examines how consumer sentiments about the two firms evolved in response to the crisis. (...) Our analyses show that while both firms suffered, the damage to the offending firm (which spread fake news to cause the crisis) was more detrimental, in terms of advertising effectiveness and negative news publicity, than that to the victim firm (which suffered from the false claim). Our study indicates that, even apart from ethical concerns, the false claim about the victim firm was not an effective business strategy to increase the offending firm’s performance. (shrink)

Two popular models of trustworthiness have garnered support over the years. One has postulated three aspects of trustworthiness as state-based antecedents to trust. Another has been interpreted to comprise two aspects of trustworthiness. Empirical data shows support for both models, and debate remains as to the theoretical and practical reasons researchers may adopt one model over the other. The present research aimed to consider this debate by investigating the factor structure of trustworthiness. Taking items from two scales commonly employed to (...) assess trustworthiness, we leveraged structural equation modeling to explore which theoretical model is supported by the data in an organizational trust context. We considered an array of first-order, second-order, and bifactor models. The best-fitting model was a bifactor model comprising one general trustworthiness factor and ability, benevolence, and integrity grouping factors. This model was determined to be essentially unidimensional, though this is qualified by the finding that the grouping variables accounted for significant variance with for several organizational outcome criteria. These results suggest that respondents typically employ a general factor when responding to items assessing trustworthiness, and researchers may be better served treating the construct as unidimensional or engaging in scale parceling of their models to reflect this response tendency more accurately. However, the substantial variance accounted by the grouping variables in hierarchical regression suggest there may be contexts in which it would be acceptable to consider the theoretical factors of ability, benevolence, and integrity independent of general trustworthiness. (shrink)

This volume centers on debates about how far moral judgments bind across traditions and epochs. Nowadays such debates appear especially volatile, both in popular culture and intellectual discourse: although there is increasing agreement that the moral and political criteria invoked in human rights documents possess cross-cultural force, many modern and postmodern developments erode confidence in moral appeals that go beyond a local consensus or apply outside a particular community. Often the point of departure for discussion is the Enlightenment paradigm of (...) a common morality, in which it is assumed that certain unchanging beliefs inhere in the structure of human reason. Whereas some thinkers continue to defend this paradigm, others modify it in diverse ways without abandoning entirely the attempt to address a universal audience, and still others jettison virtually all of its distinguishing features. Exhibiting a range of positions Western participants take in these debates, this volume seeks to advance the substance of the debates themselves without prejudging the outcome. Rival assessments of the Enlightenment paradigm are offered from various philosophical and theological points of view. In addition to the editors, the contributors include Robert Merrihew Adams, Annette C. Baier, Alan Donagan, Margaret A. Farley, Alan Gewirth, David Little, Richard Rorty, Jeffrey Stout, and Lee H. Yearley. (shrink)

Questions concerning the moral status of embryos, the validity of new technologies for human reproduction, ownership of one's own genes, gene patenting, privacy and discrimination have all been raised and debated. Although debate is healthy, it is only useful if all participants understand the fundamental biological principles underlying human life, human genes and human parenthood. Many people believe that science can play no role in determining when human life begins. I argue that this false assumption is based on a (...) failure to separate different contradictory meanings of the term ‘human life’. In actuality, science has provided great insight into when and how human life and human beings come into existence. I argue as well that, contrary to our intuitive feelings, there is no physical connection between any father and his son; shared genes represent shared information and nothing more. Nevertheless, the feeling of a physical connection between parent and child is very real and instinctive, no matter how false it may be. These new understandings have profound ramifications for the way we treat issues surrounding human reproduction, including both abortion and assisted reproductive technologies. (shrink)

Integration (interaction among parts of an entity) is suggested to be necessary for individuality (contra, Metaphysics and the Origin of Species). A synchronic species is an integrated individual that can evolve as a unified whole; a diachronic lineage is a non-integrated historical entity that cannot evolve. Synchronic species and diachronic lineages are consequently suggested to be ontologically distinct entities, rather than alternative perspectives of the same underlying entity (contra Baum (1998), Syst. Biol. 47, 641–653; de Queiroz (1995), Endless Forms: Species (...) and Speciation, pp. 57–75; Genes, Categories and Species). Species concepts usually refer to either one or the other entity; for instance, the Biological Species Concept refers to synchronic species, whereas the Cladistic Species Concept refers to diachronic lineages. The debate over species concepts has often failed to recognise this distinction, resulting in invalid comparisons between definitions that attempt to delineate fundamentally different entities. (shrink)

This volume centers on debates about how far moral judgments bind across traditions and epochs. Nowadays such debates appear especially volatile, both in popular culture and intellectual discourse: although there is increasing agreement that the moral and political criteria invoked in human rights documents possess cross-cultural force, many modern and postmodern developments erode confidence in moral appeals that go beyond a local consensus or apply outside a particular community. Often the point of departure for discussion is the Enlightenment paradigm of (...) a common morality, in which it is assumed that certain unchanging beliefs inhere in the structure of human reason. Whereas some thinkers continue to defend this paradigm, others modify it in diverse ways without abandoning entirely the attempt to address a universal audience, and still others jettison virtually all of its distinguishing features. Exhibiting a range of positions Western participants take in these debates, this volume seeks to advance the substance of the debates themselves without prejudging the outcome. Rival assessments of the Enlightenment paradigm are offered from various philosophical and theological points of view. In addition to the editors, the contributors include Robert Merrihew Adams, Annette C. Baier, Alan Donagan, Margaret A. Farley, Alan Gewirth, David Little, Richard Rorty, Jeffrey Stout, and Lee H. Yearley. (shrink)

The discovery, more than 60 years ago, of a mutant mouse with a short tail led to the birth of the new field of developmental genetics. Over the years since, numerous investigators have probed the biology of the original short‐tail mutation at the T locus, as well the naturally‐occurring t haplotypes that were uncovered as a result of their interaction with this mutation. Although the T locus ranks among the best characterized developmental loci in the mouse, it was not among (...) the first to be cloned. This situation has now been rectified with two recent reports from Herrmann, Lehrach and their colleagues. While the T locus is expressed uniquely in the embryonic tissues predicted from the mutant phenotype, the gene itself, as well as the predicted amino acid sequence of the T product, show no strong homology to any known sequence. For the moment, at least, the mystery behind the function of the T locus still awaits definitive resolution. (shrink)

In this paper I will discuss three areas in which advances in human reproductive technology could occur, their uses and abuses, and their effects on society. First is the potential to drastically increase the success rate and availability of in vitro fertilization and embryo freezing. Second is the ability to perform biopsies on embryos prior to the onset of pregnancy. Finally, I will consider the adding or altering of genes in embryos, commonly referred to as genetic engineering.As new reproductive technologies (...) pass from experimental models into the potential for medical utilization, I believe that it will be important for lawmakers everywhere to avoid the impulse to outlaw procedures that a society believes to be unnatural at a first glance. Rather, I would hope that they can respond thoughtfully with legislation that serves two purposes — to protect the rights of couples to overcome infertility or to reduce the risk of genetic disease in their children-to-be, and more importantly, to protect children-to-be from the abuses that could result from some of the practices that I will discuss. (shrink)

The larval arms of echinoid plutei are used for locomotion and feeding. They are composed of internal calcite skeletal rods covered by an ectoderm layer bearing a ciliary band. Skeletogenesis includes an autonomous molecular differentiation program in primary mesenchyme cells (PMCs), initiated when PMCs leave the vegetal plate for the blastocoel, and a patterning of the differentiated skeletal units that requires molecular cues from the overlaying ectoderm. The arms represent a larval feature that arose in the echinoid lineage during the (...) Paleozoic and offers a subject for the study of gene co-option in the evolution of novel larval features. We isolated new molecular markers in two closely related but differently developing species, Heliocidaris tuberculata and Heliocidaris erythrogramma. We report the expression of a larval arm-associated ectoderm gene tetraspanin, as well as two new PMC markers, advillin and carbonic anhydrase. Tetraspanin localizes to the animal half of blastula stage H. tuberculata and then undergoes a restriction into the putative oral ectoderm and future location of the postoral arms, where it continues to be expressed at the leading edge of both the postoral and anterolateral arms. In H. erythrogramma, its expression initiates in the animal half of blastulae and expands over the entire ectoderm from gastrulation onward. Advillin and carbonic anhydrase are upregulated in the PMCs postgastrulation and localized to the leading edge of the growing larval arms of H. tuberculata but do not exhibit coordinated expression in H. erythrogramma larvae. The tight spatiotemporal regulation of these genes in H. tuberculata along with other ontogenetic and phylogenetic evidence suggest that pluteus arms are novel larval organs, distinguishable from the processes of skeletogenesis per se. The dissociation of expression control in H. erythrogramma suggest that coordinate gene expression in H. tuberculata evolved as part of the evolution of pluteus arms, and is not required for larval or adult development. (shrink)

Adaptive mutation is defined as a process that, during nonlethal selections, produces mutations that relieve the selective pressure whether or not other, nonselected mutations are also produced. Examples of adaptive mutation or related phenomena have been reported in bacteria and yeast but not yet outside of microorganisms. A decade of research on adaptive mutation has revealed mechanisms that may increase mutation rates under adverse conditions. This article focuses on mechanisms that produce adaptive mutations in one strain of Escherichia coli, FC40. (...) These mechanisms include recombination-induced DNA replication, the placement of genes on a conjugal plasmid, and a transient mutator state. The implications of these various phenomena for adaptive evolution in microorganisms are discussed. BioEssays 22:1067–1074, 2000. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

Abstractp53 is a multifunctional protein which plays a role in modulating gene transcription, policing cell cycle checkpoints, activating apoptosis, controlling DNA replication and repair, maintaining genomic stability and responding to genetic insults. Mutation of the p53 gene confers the single greatest known selective advantage favoring cancer formation. Point mutations result not only in the loss of tumor suppressor functions, but also in the gain of tumor promotion functions. These dual circumstances may be unique to p53 and, in part, (...) could explain the relatively powerful force behind this selection pressure. General mechanisms of gain of function by mutated p53 may include alteration in transcriptional modulation and newly acquired targets for transcriptional regulation and protein binding. Despite the direct significance of p53 mutations, loss of the remaining wild‐type allele is usually required for the formation of tumors in the natural setting. Novel applications of the basic scientific knowledge of p53 could lead to an improvement in cancer treatment, hopefully in the not so distant future. (shrink)

Cyclin‐dependent kinase 5 (Cdk5) is recognized as an essential molecule in the brain, where it regulates several neuronal activities, including cytoskeletal remodeling and synaptic transmission. While activity of Cdk5 has primarily been associated with neurons, there are now substantial data indicating that the kinase's activity and function are more general. An increasing body of evidence has established Cdk5 kinase activity, the presence of the Cdk5 activators, p35 and p39, and Cdk5 functions in non‐neuronal cells, including myocytes, pancreatic β‐cells, monocytic and (...) neutrophilic leucocytes, glial cells and germ cells. In this review, we present the diverse roles of Cdk5 in several extraneuronal paradigms. The unique properties of each of the different cell types appear to involve distinct means of Cdk5 regulation and function. The potential mechanisms through which Cdk5 regulates extraneuronal cell activities such as exocytosis, gene transcription, wound healing and senescence are discussed. BioEssays 28: 1023–1034, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Processed pseudogenes may serve as a genetic reservoir for evolutionary innovation. Here, we argue that through the activity of long interspersed element‐1 retrotransposons, processed pseudogenes disperse coding and noncoding sequences rich with regulatory potential throughout the human genome. While these sequences may appear to be non‐functional, a lack of contemporary function does not prohibit future development of biological activity. Here, we discuss the dynamic evolution of certain processed pseudogenes into coding and noncoding genes and regulatory elements, and their implication in (...) wide‐ranging biological and pathological processes. Also see the video abstract here: https://youtu.be/iUY_mteVoPI. (shrink)

Lymphangiogenesis is an important developmental process that is critical to regulation of fluid homeostasis, immune surveillance and response as well as pathogenesis of a number of diseases, among them cancer, inflammation, and heart failure. Specification, formation, and maturation of lymphatic blood vessels involves an interplay between a series of events orchestrated by various transcription factors that determine expression of key genes involved in lymphangiogenesis. These are traditionally thought to be under control of several key growth factors including vascular growth factor‐C (...) (VEGF‐C) and fibroblast growth factors (FGFs). Recent insights into VEGF and FGF signaling point to their role in control of endothelial metabolic processes such as glycolysis and fatty acid oxidation that, in turn, play a major role in regulation of lymphangiogenesis. These advances have significantly increased our understanding of lymphatic biology and opened new therapeutic vistas. Here we review our current understanding of metabolic controls in the lymphatic vasculature. (shrink)

Mitochondria are increasingly being recognized as information hubs that sense cellular changes and transmit messages to other cellular components, such as the nucleus, the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), the Golgi apparatus, and lysosomes. Nonetheless, the interaction between mitochondria and the nucleus is of special interest because they both host part of the cellular genome. Thus, the communication between genome‐bearing organelles would likely include gene expression regulation. Multiple nuclear‐encoded proteins have been known to regulate mitochondrial gene expression. On the contrary, (...) no mitochondrial‐encoded factors are known to actively regulate nuclear gene expression. MOTS‐c (mitochondrial open reading frame of the 12S ribosomal RNA type‐c) is a recently identified peptide encoded within the mitochondrial 12S ribosomal RNA gene that has metabolic functions. Notably, MOTS‐c can translocate to the nucleus upon metabolic stress (e.g., glucose restriction and oxidative stress) and directly regulate adaptive nuclear gene expression to promote cellular homeostasis. It is hypothesized that cellular fitness requires the coevolved mitonuclear genomes to coordinate adaptive responses using gene‐encoded factors that cross‐regulate the opposite genome. This suggests that cellular gene expression requires the bipartite split genomes to operate as a unified system, rather than the nucleus being the sole master regulator. (shrink)

The embryonic vertebrate face is composed of similarly sized buds of neural crest‐derived mesenchyme encased in epithelium. These buds or facial prominences grow and fuse together to give the postnatal morphology characteristic of each species. Here we review the role of neural crest cells and foregut endoderm in differentiating facial features. We relate the developing facial prominences to the skeletal structure of the face and review the signals and genes that have been shown to play an important role in facial (...) morphogenesis. We also examine two experiments one at the genetic level and one at the signal level in which transformation of facial prominences and subsequent change of jaw identity was induced. We propose that signals such as retinoids and BMPs and downstream transcription factors such as Distal‐less related genes specify jaw identity. BioEssays 25:554–568, 2003. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

The origin of marine invertebrate larvae has been an area of controversy in developmental evolution for over a century. Here, we address the question of whether a pelagic “larval” or benthic “adult” morphology originated first in metazoan lineages by testing the hypothesis that particular gene co-option patterns will be associated with the origin of feeding, indirect developing larval forms. Empirical evidence bearing on this hypothesis is derivable from gene expression studies of the sea urchin larval gut of two (...) closely related but differently developing congenerics, Heliocidaris tuberculata (feeding indirect-developing larva) and H. erythrogramma (nonfeeding direct developer), given two subsidiary hypotheses. (1) If larval gut gene expression in H. tuberculata was co-opted from an ancestral adult expression pattern, then the gut expression pattern will remain in adult H. erythrogramma despite its direct development. (2) Genes expressed in the larval gut of H. tuberculata will not have a coordinated expression pattern in H. erythrogramma larvae due to loss of a functional gut. Five structural genes expressed in the invaginating archenteron of H. tuberculata during gastrulation exhibit substantially different expression patterns in H. erythrogramma with only one remaining endoderm specific. Expression of these genes in the adult of H. erythrogramma and larval gut of H. tuberculata, but not in H. erythrogramma larval endoderm, supports the hypothesis that they first played roles in the formation of adult structures and were subsequently recruited into larval ontogeny during the origin and evolution of feeding planktotrophic deuterostome larvae. (shrink)

We identify two processes by which humans increase genetic exchange among groups of individuals: by affecting the distribution of groups and dispersal patterns across a landscape, and by affecting interbreeding among sympatric or parapatric groups. Each of these processes might then have two different effects on biodiversity: changes in the number of taxa through merging or splitting of groups, and the extinction/extirpation of taxa through effects on fitness. We review the various ways in which humans are affecting genetic exchange, and (...) highlight the difficulties in predicting the impacts on biodiversity. Gene flow and hybridization are crucially important evolutionary forces influencing biodiversity. Humans alter natural patterns of genetic exchange in myriad ways, and these anthropogenic effects are likely to influence the genetic integrity of populations and species. We argue that taking a gene-centric view towards conservation will help resolve issues pertaining to conservation and management.Editor's suggested further reading in BioEssays A systemic view of biodiversity and its conservation: Processes, interrelationships, and human culture Abstract. (shrink)

Scientists now agree that common diseases arise through interactions of genetic and environmental factors, but there is less agreement about how scientific research should account for these interactions. This paper examines the politics of quantification in gene–environment interaction research. Drawing on interviews and observations with GEI researchers who study common, complex diseases, we describe quantification as an unfolding moral economy of science, in which researchers collectively enact competing “virtues.” Dominant virtues include molecular precision, in which behavioral and social risk (...) factors are moved into the body, and “harmonization,” in which scientists create large data sets and common interests in multisited consortia. We describe the negotiations and trade-offs scientists enact in order to produce credible knowledge and the forms of discipline that shape researchers, their practices, and objects of study. We describe how prevailing techniques of quantification are premised on the shrinking of the environment in the interest of producing harmonized data and harmonious scientists, leading some scientists to argue that social, economic, and political influences on disease patterns are sidelined in postgenomic research. We consider how a variety of GEI researchers navigate quantification’s productive and limiting effects on the science of etiological complexity. (shrink)

This focus issue considers the normative implications of the recent emergence in genome editing technology known as CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) or CRISPR‐associated protein 9. Originally discovered in the adaptive immune systems of bacteria and archaea, CRISPR enables researchers to make efficient and site‐specific modifications to the genomes of cells and organisms. More accessible, precise, and economic than previous gene editing technologies, CRISPR holds the promise of not only transforming the fields of genetics, agriculture, and human (...) medicine, but also heralding a new era of democratized biotechnology. However, the speed with which developments in the field have progressed threatens to overwhelm our normative sensibilities about the long‐term practical and ethical implications. The contributors to this focus issue attempt to think through some of the more salient moral and practical consequences of CRISPR in the context of religious ethics, particularly as they relate to themes of autonomy, human flourishing, social justice, and the ethics of enhancement. (shrink)

This article seeks to explain the transformation of culture using the mechanism of evolutionary theory. Social biologists have been dealing with this issue for many years now. However, these scholars have not sufficiently allowed for the importance of factors independent of genes. They have primarily thought of culture as nothing more than the expansion of genes, as an increase in the rate of genetic adaptation. Namely, they have focused less on culture itself and more on its natural origins. Even while (...) accepting the dual inheritance model that the structure of biological genes and cultural transmission is different, this article seeksto take a step further. My aim is to show how culture that takes shape on the group level is explainable on the cultural genetic level. Seen from the point of view of culture genetics, the transformation of culture signifies the transformation in the frequency of a cultural gene. At this point, we are thus faced with the following questions: 1) Is it possible to concretize the units of culture genes? 2) What is the fundamental characteristic of a culture gene? and 3) What relationship is there between biological genes and cultural genes? This article will prove that it is indeed possible to concretize the units of culture genes, that the most substantialfundamental characteristic of a cultural gene is, as would be expected, to clone itself, and that cultural genes and biological genes exist within multiple relationships of cooperation, conflict, and reciprocity. Finally, this article will further concretize the dual inheritance model with a careful examination of its two patterns of evolutionary explanation, the reductionist on the one hand, and the non-reductionist on the other. This examination will conclude that, in terms of culture, the non-reductionist model is the most suitable. (shrink)

A central problem for the international governance of heritable germline gene editing is that there are important differences in attitudes and values as well as ethical and health care considerations around the world. These differences are reflected in a complicated and diverse regulatory landscape. Several publications have discussed whether reproductive uses would be legally permissible in individual countries and whether clinical applications could emerge in the context of regulatory gaps and gray areas. Systematic comparative studies that explore issues related (...) to the governance of this technology from different national and international perspectives are needed to address the lack of knowledge in this area. In this research report, we contribute to filling this gap by presenting views of stakeholders in the United Kingdom on challenges to the governance of heritable genome editing. We present findings from a multistakeholder study conducted in the United Kingdom between October 2016 and January 2018 and funded by the Wellcome Trust. This research included interviews, literature analysis, and a workshop. We involved leading U.K. scientists, in vitro fertilization clinicians, and representatives from regulatory bodies, patient organizations, and other civil societal organizations, as well as fertility companies. Part one of this article explores stakeholder perceptions of possible global developments in heritable genome editing and associated risks and governance challenges. Part two presents a range of policy options that were generated during the workshop in relation to the challenges discussed in part one. (shrink)

Organismal form arises by the coordinated movement, arrangement, and activity of cells. In metazoans, most morphogenetic programs that establish the recognizable body plan of any given species are initiated during the developmental period, although in many species growth continues throughout life. By comparing the cellular and molecular development of the bilaterians (bilaterally symmetrical animals) to the development of their closest outgroup, the cnidarians, it appears that morphogenesis and the cell fate specification associated with germ layer formation during the process of (...) gastrulation are separately controlled by two distinct downstream pathways (canonical and planar cell polarity) of Wnt signaling. Furthermore, a fundamental change in the early developmental program, the positioning of the site of gastrulation, allowed the spatial separation of gene regulatory networks that facilitated the rapid diversification of bilaterian body plans. (shrink)

The Plant Ontology (PO) is a community resource consisting of standardized terms, definitions, and logical relations describing plant structures and development stages, augmented by a large database of annotations from genomic and phenomic studies. This paper describes the structure of the ontology and the design principles we used in constructing PO terms for plant development stages. It also provides details of the methodology and rationale behind our revision and expansion of the PO to cover development stages for all plants, particularly (...) the land plants (bryophytes through angiosperms). As a case study to illustrate the general approach, we examine variation in gene expression across embryo development stages in Arabidopsis and maize, demonstrating how the PO can be used to compare patterns of expression across stages and in developmentally different species. Although many genes appear to be active throughout embryo development, we identified a small set of uniquely expressed genes for each stage of embryo development and also between the two species. Evaluating the different sets of genes expressed during embryo development in Arabidopsis or maize may inform future studies of the divergent developmental pathways observed in monocotyledonous versus dicotyledonous species. The PO and its annotation databasemake plant data for any species more discoverable and accessible through common formats, thus providing support for applications in plant pathology, image analysis, and comparative development and evolution. (shrink)

It seems certain that one day we will allow the genetic technology which will enhance our offspring. A highly effective new tool, called CRISPR, which allows for carving out genes, is already being used to edit the genomes of animals. In July 2017, the FDA legalized that germline drugs for therapeutic purposes could be sold in the market. It is a high time, now, that we need engage in discussions about the ethics of germline intervention. To contribute to the discussion (...) by showing our thought and to educate the public, we write this paper. (shrink)

The Deaf culture in the United States is a unique culture that is not widely understood. To members of the Deaf community in the United States, deafness is not viewed as a disease or pathology to be treated or cured; instead it is seen as a difference in human experience. Members of this community do not hide their deafness; instead they take great pride in their Deaf identity. The Deaf culture in the United States is very communitarian not individualistic. Mary (...) Beth and Dominic are a married couple in their late 20s who are genetically deaf. They are active members in the Deaf community and work as advocates for individuals who are deaf, family members of Deaf people and sign language interpreters who identify with the Deaf culture. Mary Beth and Dominic approach the fertility clinic with a request that they only want a child with the genetic gene for deafness. They would want the embryos that do not have the gene to be destroyed. This would entail creating a child who would have the gene for deafness. Medically and ethically, should the fertility clinic agree to the couple’s request? The authors argue that the couple's request should be denied and provide reasons for it from the perspectives of foundational and clinical ethics. (shrink)

The combination of decreased genotyping costs and prolific social media use is fueling a personal genetic testing industry in which consumers purchase and interact with genetic risk information online. Consumers and their genetic risk profiles are protected in some respects by the 2008 federal Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA), which forbids the discriminatory use of genetic information by employers and health insurers; however, practical and technical limitations undermine its enforceability, given the everyday practices of online social networking and its impact (...) on the workplace. In the Web 2.0 era, employers in most states can legally search about job candidates and employees online, probing social networking sites for personal information that might bear on hiring and employment decisions. We examine GINA's protections for online sharing of genetic information as well as its limitations, and propose policy recommendations to address current gaps that leave employees? genetic information vulnerable in a Web-based world. (shrink)

Graphical AbstractThe SRY gene, which is located on the Y chromosome and directs male development, may promote aggression and other traditionally male behavioural traits, resulting in the fight-or-flight reaction to stress.

A complete, high‐quality reference sequence of a dog genome was recently produced by a team of researchers led by the Broad Institute, achieving another major milestone in deciphering the genomic landscape of mammalian organisms. The genome sequence provides an indispensable resource for comparative analysis and novel insights into dog and human evolution and history. Together with the survey sequence of a poodle previously published in 2003, the two dog genome sequences allowed identification of more than 2.5 million single nucleotide polymorphisms (...) within and between dog breeds, which can be used in evolutionary analysis, behavioral studies and disease gene mapping.1 © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. BioEssays 28: 569–573, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Progressive supranuclear palsy is a movement disorder with prominent tau neuropathology. Brain diseases with abnormal tau deposits are called tauopathies, the most common of which is Alzheimer's disease. Environmental causes of tauopathies include repetitive head trauma associated with some sports. To identify common genetic variation contributing to risk for tauopathies, we carried out a genome-wide association study of 1,114 individuals with PSP and 3,247 controls followed by a second stage in which we genotyped 1,051 cases and 3,560 controls for the (...) stage 1 SNPs that yielded P ≤ 10-3. We found significant previously unidentified signals associated with PSP risk at STX6, EIF2AK3 and MOBP. We confirmed two independent variants in MAPT affecting risk for PSP, one of which influences MAPT brain expression. The genes implicated encode proteins for vesicle-membrane fusion at the Golgi-endosomal interface, for the endoplasmic reticulum unfolded protein response and for a myelin structural component. © 2011 Nature America, Inc. All rights reserved. (shrink)

Many lymphokine genes have now been cloned from activated T cells and their products have been expressed in mammalian cells. Use of these recombinant lymphokines has provided the opportunity to evaluate both the spectrum of their biological activities and the mechanisms of their action in promoting proliferation and differentiation of hemopoietic and lymphoid cells. Characterization of the structure of lymphokine genes will provide information about their regulated expression in T‐cell activation.

The fact that genes and environment contribute differentially to variation in human behaviors, traits and attitudes is central to the field of behavior genetics. Perceptions about these differential contributions may affect ideas about human agency. We surveyed two independent samples (N = 301 and N = 740) to assess beliefs about free will, determinism, political orientation, and the relative contribution of genes and environment to 21 human traits. We find that lay estimates of genetic influence on these traits cluster into (...) four distinct groups, which differentially predict beliefs about human agency, political orientation, and religiosity. Despite apparent ideological associations with these beliefs, the correspondence between mean lay estimates and published heritability estimates for the surveyed traits is large (r = .77). Belief in genetic determinism emerges as a modest predictor of accuracy in these lay estimates. Additionally, educated mothers with multiple children emerge as particularly accurate in their estimates of the genetic contribution to these traits. (shrink)

Directed cell migration is a fundamental component of numerous biological systems and is critical to the pathology of many diseases. Although the importance of secreted chemoattractant factors in providing navigational cues to migrating cells bearing specific chemoattractant receptors is now well‐established, how the function of these factors is regulated is not so well understood and may be of key importance to the design of new therapeutics for numerous human diseases. While regulation of migration clearly takes place on a number of (...) different levels, it is becoming clear that so‐called ‘atypical’ receptors play a role in scavenging, or altering the localisation of, chemoattractant molecules such as chemokines and complement components. These receptors do this through binding and/or internalising their chemoattractant ligands without activating signal transduction cascades leading to cell migration. The atypical chemokine receptor family currently comprises the receptors D6, DARC and CCX‐CKR. In this review, we discuss the evidence from in vitro and in vivo studies that these receptors play a role in regulating cell migration, and speculate that other orphan receptors may also belong to this family. Furthermore, with the advent of gene therapy on the horizon, the therapeutic potential of these receptors in human disease is also considered. BioEssays 29: 237–247, 2007. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

BackgroundObtaining a research participant’s voluntary and informed consent is the bedrock of sound ethics practice. Greater inclusion of children in research has led to questions about how paediatric consent operates in practice to accord with current and emerging legal and socio-ethical issues, norms, and requirements.MethodsEmploying a qualitative thematic content analysis, we examined paediatric consent forms from major academic centres and public organisations across Canada dated from 2008–2011, which were purposively selected to reflect different types of research ethics boards, participants, and (...) studies. The studies included biobanking, longitudinal studies, and gene-environment studies. Our purpose was to explore the following six emerging issues: (1) whether the scope of parental consent allows for a child’s assent, dissent, or future consent; (2) whether the concepts of risk and benefit incorporate the child’s psychological and social perspective; (3) whether a child’s ability to withdraw is respected and to what extent withdrawal is permitted; (4) whether the return of research results includes individual results and/or incidental findings and the processes involved therein; (5) whether privacy and confidentiality concerns adequately address the child’s perspective and whether standard data and/or sample identifiability nomenclature is used; and (6) whether retention of and access to paediatric biological samples and associated medical data are addressed.ResultsThe review suggests gaps and variability in the consent forms with respect to addressing each of the six issues. Many forms did not discuss the possibility of returning research results, be they individual or general/aggregate results. Forms were also divided in terms of the scope of parental consent (specific versus broad), and none discussed a process for resolving disputes that can arise when either the parents or the child wishes to withdraw from the study.ConclusionsThe analysis provides valuable insight and evidence into how consent forms address current ethical issues. While we do not thoroughly explore the contexts and reasons behind consent form gaps and variability, we do advocate and formulate the development of best practices for drafting paediatric health research consent forms. This can greatly ameliorate current gaps and facilitate harmonised and yet contextualised approaches to paediatric health research ethics. (shrink)

A few years ago no one would have suspected that the well‐known disorder of connective tissue, Marfan syndrome, could be caused by mutations in a recently discovered extracellular component, fibrillin. Likewise, nobody would have predicted that fibrillin represents a small family of proteins that are associated with several pheno‐typically overlapping disorders. The fibrillins are integral constituents of the non‐collagenous microfibrils, with an average diameter of 10 nm. These aggregates are distributed in the extracellular matrix of virtually every tissue. Microfibrillar bundles (...) provide the external coating to elastin in elastic fibers, and serve an anchoring function in non‐elastic tissues. At higher resolution, individual microfibrils have a “beads‐on‐a‐string” appearance resulting from the head‐to‐tail polymerization of multiple fibrillin aggregates. Structurally, fibrillin contains a series of repeated sequences homologous to the epidermal growth factor calcium‐binding motif. Characterization of fibrillin mutations in Marfan syndrome patients, together with the elucidation of the structure of the fibrillin proteins, have provided new insights, and raised new questions, about the function of the 10 nm microfibrils. For example, it is possible that the fibrillins, in addition to serving a structural function, might also be involved in regulating cellular activities and morphogenetic programs. It is fitting that the long search for the Marfan syndrome gene has brought a novel group of proteins to the forefront of extracellular matrix biology. (shrink)

Predicting the phenotype of an organism from its genotype is a central question in genetics. Most importantly, we would like to find out if the perturbation of a single gene may be the cause of a disease. However, our current ability to predict the phenotypic effects of perturbations of individual genes is limited. Network models of genes are one tool for tackling this problem. In a recent study, (Lee et al.) it has been shown that network models covering the (...) majority of genes of an organism can be used for accurately predicting phenotypic effects of gene perturbations in multicellular organisms. BioEssays 30:707–710, 2008. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Profoundly important ethical and political controversies turn on the question of whether biological life is an essential aspect of a human person, or only an extrinsic instrument. Lee and George argue that human beings are physical, animal organisms - albeit essentially rational and free - and examine the implications of this understanding of human beings for some of the most controversial issues in contemporary ethics and politics. The authors argue that human beings are animal organisms and that their personal identity (...) across time consists in the persistence of the animal organisms they are; they also argue that human beings are essentially rational and free and that there is a radical difference between human beings and other animals; criticize hedonism and hedonistic drug-taking; present detailed defenses of the prolife positions on abortion and euthanasia; and defend the traditional moral position on marriage and sexual acts. (shrink)

This paper examines the idea of objective phenomenology, or a way of understanding the phenomenal character of conscious experiences that doesn’t require one to have had the kinds of experiences under consideration. My central thesis is that structural facts about experience—facts that characterize purely how conscious experiences are structured—are objective phenomenal facts. I begin by precisifying the idea of objective phenomenology and diagnosing what makes any given phenomenal fact subjective. Then I defend the view that structural facts about experience are (...) objective. I also argue that structural facts about experience, despite being objective, nevertheless still give rise to an explanatory gap. (shrink)

Credal reductivism is the view that outright belief is reducible to degrees of confidence or ‘credence’. The most popular versions of credal reductivism all have the consequence that if you are near-maximally confident that p in a low-stakes situation, then you outright believe p. This paper addresses a recent objection to this consequence—the Correctness Objection— introduced by Jeremy Fantl and Matthew McGrath and further developed by Jacob Ross and Mark Schroeder. The objection is that near-maximal confidence cannot entail outright belief (...) because when you believe a false proposition, you are wrong or incorrect, whereas you can be highly confident of a false proposition in a low-stakes situation without being incorrect. Both Fantl and McGrath’s and Ross and Schoeder’s versions of the Correctness Objection admit of multiple interpretations. But it is argued that even on the most charitable interpretations the objection fails. (shrink)

_Philosophers consider race and racism from the perspective of lived, bodily experience._.

The normativity of so-called “coherence” or “structural” requirements of rationality has been hotly debated in recent years. However, relatively little has been said about the nature of structural rationality, or what makes a set of attitudes structurally irrational, if structural rationality is not ultimately a matter of responding correctly to reasons. This paper develops a novel account of incoherence (or structural irrationality), critically examining Alex Worsnip’s recent account. It first argues that Worsnip’s account both over-generates and under-generates incoherent patterns of (...) attitudes, and then proposes an alternative that both avoids these problems and captures a crucial insight behind Worsnip’s account. According to this account, a set of attitudes is incoherent just in case having all of the attitudes in that set is incompatible with reacting to a question in a way that one is, in virtue of having the attitudes, committed to. (shrink)