Mary Carmichael

In the last couple of weeks, two new papers have had genetics enthusiasts buzzing: one a study that turned up 95 gene variants linked to cholesterol levels, and the other a similarly designed study of personality traits that turned up no genes at all. There must be a reason the findings came out so differently.

The American Cancer Society has just launched a new nationwide print and online ad campaign to raise funds for a program that screens disadvantaged women for breast and cervical cancer. This does not sound controversial until you look at one of the ads.

After a week of soliciting experts, NEWSWEEK's Mary Carmichael is ready to decide whether or not she wants to take an at-home genetic test. Or is she?

The full transcript of Mary Carmichael's interview with FDA officials on the potential regulation of direct-to-consumer genetic tests.

Will increased regulation mean that at-home genetic tests will no longer be available to consumers? As rumors swirl about imminent action from the Food and Drug Administration, our writer wonders if she should hurry up and test her DNA.

In my weeklong quest to decide if I should have a genetic test, I now knew what I could expect to learn. But how was I going to feel about the results if I went forward and got them? Would I be able to trust them (and should I)?

On day two of her investigation, NEWSWEEK's Mary Carmichael asks five experts what information take-home DNA tests can and can't find.

More genetic testing information from around the Web.

As Congress grows closer to regulating direct-to-consumer DNA tests off the market, a NEWSWEEK reporter sets forth on a weeklong quest to determine if the tests are worth taking.

By the end of the week, writer Mary Carmichael will decide whether or not to take a direct-to-consumer genetic test. Here's more information about her project.

Popular Web outlet ScienceBlogs is still trying to recover from a botched corporate sponsorship with Pepsi. But while its bloggers slowly return to work, ScienceBlogs is also expanding a noncommercial deal with academic institutes that raises questions about what "editorial integrity" really means.

Malaria kills a million people a year, most of them kids and pregnant women. Why can’t we stop it? Here are some surprising conclusions—including pointed criticisms of current relief efforts as “quick fixes.” Plus, like the best infectious-disease lit, it’s a real creepfest.

Remember that study in the journal Science from last week linking a whole bunch of genes—including unexpectedly powerful ones—to extreme old age in centenarians? NEWSWEEK reported that some of outside experts thought it sounded too good to be true, perhaps because of an error in the way the genes were identified that could cause false-positive results.

A new study published in the journal Science found dozens of genes that appeared to affect whether humans can live to be 100 or older. But is the media overhyping the results?

This RV could change the face of health care in America and solve one of the most pressing problems facing the new health-care-reform law: how to expand access while controlling costs.

Treatment for drug addiction works better, and costs less, than imprisonment alone, but politically it’s easier to cut treatment than punishment.

Parents need not worry that the measles, mumps, and rubella injection will increase their children’s risk of autism, but kids given a vaccine that also protects against chicken pox have a slightly higher risk of developing febrile seizures, the scary if ultimately harmless phenomenon that accompanies a bad fever.

Any given antidepressant tends to help only about a third of patients. Now a new DNA test may be able to predict what medication will be most effective based on gene variants. Sounds promising, but does it work?

Fifty is the new thirty -- but that doesn’t mean that as you age, you can live like a college kid. Follow these simple steps to help ensure that you thrive for years to come. Plus: when should women get screened for breast cancer?

When it comes to health, we’re not living in the age of Too Much Information so much as the age of Not Quite Enough. Medical science has generated vast amounts of data and laypeople have more access to it than ever before. Look closely at that data, though, and it starts to seem disturbingly incomplete. We scoured the studies to find out exactly what you need at every age.

The longer the human lifespan stretches, the more doctors understand about staying healthy and vibrant into the senior years. What you need to know to make sure that you live long and live well.

Is there anyone who could resist a book about sex, food, art, and fun? Didn’t think so. This book is about all those things, but what turns it from a guilty pleasure into a guiltless one is its deep understanding of philosophy, developmental psychology, and evolutionary theory. Yes, it’s a science book, and a brainy one at that. But look! There’s an index entry for Jennifer Aniston! So don’t be scared

There's nothing hotter than a sweaty, well-muscled athlete, unless he's fresh off play at the World Cup and happens to be from Britain or Ghana. The only scoring those guys will be doing in the next month is on the field. Their countries reportedly have banned them from sex while they're playing in the tournament, for fear that they'll waste themselves on the wrong kind of action.

Fresh off sending stern letters to five consumer-genomics companies indicating that, as currently marketed, the companies’ tests will require clearance by the FDA, Alberto Gutierrez—the agency’s director of the Office of In Vitro Diagnostics in the Center for Devices and Radiological Health—spoke to NEWSWEEK.

The FDA has sent letters to five personal genomics companies outlining its intentions for regulation of direct-to-consumer tests, and if 23andMe thought it was having a bad week before, it's sure not going to be happy now.

A pop-song contest hopes to educate African youth about preventing a deadly illness.

The "Google makes us stoopid" argument is a perennial of modern life, and right now, it's in season. The most thorough take on the topic is Nicholas Carr’s new book, "The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains," but anyone who's been spending a lot of time surfing is probably going to be so distracted by e-mails and Facebook, etc., that he won't be able to finish the book.

It could—but the FDA and Congress also could make the burgeoning biotech industry stronger.

Andrew Wakefield, the sham scientist whose now-retracted 1998 paper led millions of parents to believe in a link between autism and the measles/mumps/rubella vaccine, has just lost his license to practice medicine in Britain. This sounds like an important development, but Wakefield doesn't think so. On the "Today Show" this morning, he described it as "a little bump in the road." ...

It’s easy to get carried away in the wake of Thursday’s announcement that Craig Venter & Co. have created what is in some sense the world’s first synthetic organism.

Did you see that gorilla just run by? Probably not. Expanding on a psychological experiment that garnered some very surprising results, Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons challenge the confidence you have about how well you observe the world around you, and how you see yourself.

On Monday, the Supreme Court released two important decisions about the prison system: one ruling that juveniles can’t receive life sentences for crimes other than murder and another that the federal government is allowed to hold sex offenders in custody indefinitely, even after they have completed their sentences.