Controversial: A proposal to ban abortions in as early as the sixth week of pregnancy continued to speed through the Louisiana legislature today, securing approval from the House Health and Welfare Committee a day after Alabama lawmakers voted for what could become the nation’s most restrictive law against the procedure. Louisiana’s ban, however, only would take effect if a federal appeals court upholds a similar law in Mississippi. Read the full story.
Contributions: ExxonMobil and its XTO Energy subsidiary employees, retirees, directors and surviving spouses contributed more than $603,000 to 22 Louisiana colleges and universities, the company said today. Those individual donations were matched by nearly $1.8 million in unrestricted grants from the ExxonMobil Foundation as part of the foundation’s 2018 Educational Matching Gift Program. Read the full announcement.
Breakthrough: Scientists have created a living organism whose DNA is entirely human-made—perhaps a new form of life, experts said, and a milestone in the field of synthetic biology, The New York Times reports. Researchers at the University of Cambridge reported today that they had rewritten the DNA of a type of bacteria. The achievement could lead to organisms that produce new medicines. Read the full story.
