Genetic engineering: manipulating the mechanisms of life

From breeding to a science of heredity

The origins of domestic plants and animals

The rise of agriculture and domestication

Early ideas of inheritance

The girl who gave birth to rabbits

Heredity and the theory of evolution

Gregor Mendel discovers the laws of heredity

Classical genetics (1900-1950)

Cell theory and the discovery of chromosomes

The rediscovery of Mendel's work

Chromosomes and heredity

The debate over natural selection

Sex and the X-Y chromosomes

Fruit flies and the birth of the modern laboratory

Gene maps

Chromosome puzzles

Maize and "jumping genes"

"One gene makes one enzyme"

Molecular genetics: what genes are and how they work (1950-1970)

Physics stimulates new ways of thinking about genes

Genes are made of DNA

The double helix

RNA is the messenger

The architecture of genes

On-off switches for genes

The flow of information from gene to protein in complex organisms

The rise of genetic engineering (1970-1990)

Recombinant DNA

Molecular cloning and using bacteria as drug factories

"Natural" genetic engineering

DNA sequencing

The polymerase chain reaction (PCR)

Making and marketing genetically modified plants and animals for food

Knockouts, knock ins, and other methods to study gene functions

Beatrice Mintz: a pioneer of mouse genetics

Transgenic animals and models of human disease

DNA fingerprinting

Genetic engineering in the age of genomes

The complexity of genomes

Introns and alternative splicing

Noncoding RNAs

Quality control: how cells detect defective genes

RNA knockouts

Molecular machines

Conditional mutagenesis

Other methods of controlling the output of genes

Molecular medicine and gene therapies

DNA vaccines and T-cell therapies

Personalized medicine in the genome age

Ethics and genetic engineering

Reproductive cloning

Therapeutic cloning and experiments with human cells

Genetic testing and concerns about eugenics

GM foods and the rise of environmental movements

Owning genes, genomes, and living beings

A look farther ahead.