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With advances in genome sequencing and computational tools to analyze genomic information, researchers are able to estimate that about 8 percent of the human genome is made of sequences that originated as invasive retroviruses. To put that number in perspective, genes make up about 1 percent to 1.5 percent of your genome.

DNA from old skeletons suggests a complex history of new DNA being introduced.

What's in a minimal cell? This is very close to the basic requirements of life as we know it. For a full 17 percent of the genes we have no clear idea of what they do.

So-called "supercoils" change the behavior of DNA, opening a new role for topology in the study of life.

The world’s most dangerous malaria parasite shuffles its genes in a clever attempt to avoid the immune system. A new approach has begun to reveal how the process works.

By comparing the genomes of different species of molds scientists have reconstructed their history. On Thursday, the scientists reported that cheese makers unwittingly have thrown their molds into evolutionary overdrive.They haven’t simply gained new genetic mutations to help them grow better in cheese. Over the past few centuries, these molds also have picked up large chunks of DNA from other species in order to thrive in their new culinary habitat.

Exercise, a new study finds, changes the shape and functioning of our genes, an important stop on the way to improved health and fitness. More than 5,000 sites on the genome of muscle cells are altered by exercise.