In a new study, published Tuesday (Feb. 18) in the journal Nature Communications, researchers used CRISPR gene editing to tweak the genomes of mice so they possessed the human version of NOVA1 ...

That is one important gene.“All baby mice make ultrasonic squeaks to their moms, and language researchers categorize the varying squeaks as four ‘letters’—S, D, U, and M. We found that ...

A new contender for a human 'language gene' can change the way that mice squeak when it is incorporated into their DNA. The gene is called NOVA1, and in our own species, it is remarkably unique.

The NOVA1 variant in modern humans, on the other hand, is found exclusively in our species, Darnell said. The presence of a gene variant isn't the only reason people can speak.

He was interested in a different gene called NOVA1, which he has studied for over two decades. NOVA1 is active in the brain, where it produces a protein that can affect the activity of other genes.

A specialist in how RNA binding proteins modulate gene expression, Darnell has been researching NOVA1 since the early 1990s, when he and his colleagues first identified it as the trigger of a ...

Organoids with the ancient NOVA1 gene also appear to mature more quickly and remain smaller than their modern counterparts, Muotri says. "The neurons start to get more active at very early stages ...

Darnell has been studying the protein – called NOVA1 and known to be crucial to brain development – since the early 1990s. For the latest research, scientists in his lab at New York’s Rockefeller ...