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Questions tagged [genetic-engineering]

For questions about the fictitious in-universe genetic engineering found in works of speculative fiction. Questions purely concerning real-world genetic engineering are off-topic.

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7 votes
1 answer
126 views

Science fiction novel on genetically engineered chimeric embryos in cows, with resulting escaped monsters

The novel is dystopian science fiction, published before 2013, in English. It is set in the US, Canada, etc. It starts with a Chinese (or Asian) woman researcher in a secret laboratory where ...
3 votes
1 answer
82 views

Was Brave New World the first book that had shaping of human embryos?

I suspect that Brave New World was the first book to have humans develop in vitro, but I am asking if any prior story had the development shaped (especially, but not limited to, by stunting) before ...
9 votes
0 answers
98 views

Clones, hazardous environment, rebirth, human rights

A second-hand softback I read in the early 1980s - possibly written in the early to mid 1970s. Possibly the complete novel, or perhaps two or three stories in the one book, no more than that. Artwork: ...
9 votes
2 answers
390 views

Book about two humans who genetically engineer themselves to be able to exist in outer space

I am trying to find out the title of a book. I read the book sometime between 2004 and 2010 I believe. It was a science fiction book about genetic engineering. I know in the book they were mixing ...
10 votes
1 answer
2k views

Old scifi book: detective, alien conspiracy, change appearance machine, huge brain in space ship, alien communicates by flashing lights from stomach

I am looking for an old book. People can use a machine to change appearance and genetically modify themselves. The main character is a detective or cop, he follows a suspect into the sewers and finds ...
6 votes
0 answers
69 views

Genetically altered seeds escape in Bay area; genetically altered children spontaneously suicide

Read a book in the 1980’s that warns of the dangers of genetic engineering. My memory is very vague as to details, but I seem to recall the book opening with modified grass or rice seeds that ...
9 votes
0 answers
119 views

People using genetic engineering to transform their offspring to live on a gaseous planet

I was hoping for some help. I remember parts of a science fiction plot point and I’m trying to locate the story. I’m not sure if it is a short story, a novel, or even an extremely short lived science ...
6 votes
0 answers
90 views

Has there been renewed interest in Cordwainer Smith's stories about chimeras?

Cordwainer Smith's stories about chimeras (see Definition 4 in this link), i.e., people who were part human and part animal seemed the farthest-out of far-out science fiction when they were first ...
8 votes
1 answer
196 views

Book series about human bioengineering with alien animal DNA [duplicate]

What i remember from the plot: Human scientists captured by alien empire, dumped on some planet with no way out alter their DNA with local animals to be on-par with alien captors regarding speed and ...
9 votes
1 answer
454 views

Country boy goes to the city, encounters shooting galleries with live targets and true love

I'm pretty sure this was in an anthology of older stories that I read in a paperback in the 90s, although the book may have dated from when my parents were growing up in the 60s and the 70s. The ...
20 votes
1 answer
3k views

Book or story where humans are genetically engineered to act as AI?

I don't remember the title or too many specifics, but here goes: Genetic engineering is ubiquitous. The system for explaining how genetic engineering works has a fixed number of "points" ...
6 votes
1 answer
1k views

1980s movie involving a genetically engineered human multiple ribs

I used to work in a video store back in 1988 and remember a VHS (a magical old format) of a movie that was pretty cool from my perspective. It had a genetically engineered human that was fully grown ...
6 votes
1 answer
182 views

Scifi book about superhuman engineered kids with progeria

This was an older sci-fi book, probably from the 80s. I read it as a child in the late 80s or early 90s. The protagonist was a fertility doctor or something similar. He found out there were these ...
10 votes
2 answers
515 views

SF short story where animals are genetically engineered to have hands and hunt hunters with guns

I'm trying to find the title and author of a short story I read about 15 years ago. Some genius genetically modifies animals to have hands and they are given guns. Humans are invited on a hunting trip ...
33 votes
0 answers
808 views

Futuristic world where reality is humanity's plaything and God is in a zoo

This is a novel I read in 2015. It was an older book. The cover was black and hardcover. Don't remember any specific details. The book was in English. I believe it was from the 1980s or ‘90s. It was ...
18 votes
2 answers
1k views

Far future SF novel with humans living in genetically engineered habitats in space

I'm looking for a novel I read in English around 1989 or 1990. I think it was written in the 80s. It was a rather thick (for the time) mass-market paperback and I think it had a picture of a guy ...
6 votes
2 answers
275 views

Building a house with mouth cement [duplicate]

So I have a series of vague impressions and a couple of details: Pretty sure this was a book, not a short story. I probably read it in the '90s... maybe earlier. I think the basic plot was that there ...
8 votes
1 answer
170 views

90s biopunk novel about near future genetic engineering

The novel is set against the backdrop of an economic collapse in the near future US. At one point a demonstration for a bailout is used as cover for a terrorist attack. There's a character who's a ...
8 votes
1 answer
443 views

Book about genetic engineering to defeat disease that turns children into hermaphrodites

The initial plot was about genetic engineering being used to defeat disease, but something went awry that caused a massive social upheaval, where people in social settings would have a lapel pin or ...
13 votes
1 answer
824 views

Web story about aliens who twist humans into various sub-humans

It was hosted on its own page and was written much like a documentary about the rise and fall of the human race from the perspective of an alien narrator. There were plenty of illustrations to show ...
6 votes
2 answers
1k views

Book about Genetic Engineering, High IQ children that don't sleep

I read a book about 20-30 years ago and can't remember what it was. Here's what I remember. The premise was that through genetic engineering the main character in the story did not need to sleep. ...
7 votes
1 answer
551 views

Gene-modified man has a 2-week period heightened reflexes and constant wakefulness

There are just a few details I recall from a novel I read about 25 years ago. The setting is a fairly unmemorable future space-faring society. I don't recall any major character aliens, but that ...
5 votes
1 answer
215 views

Novel revolving around genetic engineering

About 20 years ago I read a book that revolved around a future where genetic engineering is so commonplace that people visit genetic engineering parlors much like they do tattoo shops IRL now. At ...
4 votes
1 answer
245 views

Sci-fi book about a genetically modified planet

I read only the beginning of this book, and it was decades ago, but I always wondered about it and wanted to read it. As I recall, the protagonist finds himself stranded on a strange world. I don't ...
5 votes
1 answer
168 views

YA novel: siblings from a walled city, whose DNA is spliced with animal DNA [duplicate]

I remember a scene where they fly over a wall and land in a forest. They find a huge home and realise that when the world was dying due to overpopulation, the poor were moved to the walled area while ...
7 votes
0 answers
121 views

Series of short stories about an intelligent bear bred to fight an alien beast the size of a locomotive

I'm looking for a series of short stories about an intelligent bear (or species of such) bred to fight an alien beast the size of a locomotive. I recall only one story that featured a pack of bumbling,...
3 votes
3 answers
334 views

What examples of genetic engineering and/or eugenics are there in Star Trek other than the Eugenics Wars?

Excluding Julian Bashir and the products of the human Eugenic Wars... do we ever encounter any species in Star Trek that have engaged in significant genetic self-modification or eugenics? Basically ...
11 votes
1 answer
405 views

What's the name of that comic team with genetically engineered government agents?

The story starts with a family living in a cabin in the woods. There's a mom, a dad, and a boy, but the boy is about twenty years old or something. They're talking, I think the boy is bringing up an ...
5 votes
1 answer
215 views

Book with lasers on pyramids for electricity generation, sun flare ending the civilization, genetic engineering of pets and rebirth of civilization

An ancient civilization uses lasers mounted on pyramids to generate electricity. When a sun flare causes an uncontrollable cascade which ends their civilization, some escape to space. One group, which ...
6 votes
1 answer
409 views

Science fiction novel involving a genetically engineered servant race uplifted from non-human primates

I belive I read this while I was living in Ohio between 2002 and 2006. It was a hardback novel with a dark cover. The basic story is set somewhere a few years into the future, with society not very ...
10 votes
1 answer
701 views

Short story about the drawbacks of human telepathy on an alien planet

There will be heavy spoilers in my question. The plot is that a band of humans have been genetically engineered to be telepathic. Unfortunately, the engineered humans made the rest of humanity nervous,...
58 votes
8 answers
50k views

How did the "black liquid" work in Prometheus?

I just saw Ridley Scott's “Prometheus” and I’m still confused about how the black liquid works. Can anyone elaborate on what its function was and the mechanism by which it operated? I surmise that ...
11 votes
1 answer
334 views

Short story - engineered human terraforming civilized planet

Story is told from viewpoint of planet inhabitants whose planet is attacked by implacable terraforming ship. Turns out spaceship's only crew is giant engineered human whose only mission is to ...
8 votes
2 answers
755 views

Scifi book about small genetically engineered humans

The story was about the human beings becoming too "static" in evolutionary terms. A scientist engineers much smaller human beings, that in their infancy are "about an inch high" (IIRC). This is, he ...
7 votes
1 answer
303 views

90s Novel About Sentient Rocks

The novel had rocks discovered on some planet that were sentient. Humans used them for cell phones. They wanted to be free and enlisted some sort of geneticist sometimes called "a bodybuilder" to ...
26 votes
6 answers
4k views

Is Ender genetically-engineered?

In Ender's Game, is Ender genetically engineered (along with Peter and Valentine) or are they just naturally gifted?
6 votes
1 answer
181 views

Late 80s or early 90s book includes genetically engineered executioner with gills

A male main character was genetically engineered, had gills in his throat, and was an executioner in a post-apocalyptic world. He was able to move long distances instantly through something called the ...
13 votes
1 answer
724 views

In Asimov's The Naked Sun why didn't the Solarians use artificial insemination?

In Isaac Asimov's 1957 novel The Naked Sun it is a plot point that the inhabitants of the planet Solaria are raised to be repelled by physical contact, a fairly common theme in Asimov's work. It is ...
11 votes
1 answer
839 views

Time travel book series - Time agency alters humanity starting with the cro-magnons

I read a book a long time ago and can't remember the title. It has an agency that sends people back in time to make themselves powerful. The books all look forward to the time when the actual time ...
4 votes
1 answer
257 views

Identify SciFi story where Genetic Engineering created Fantasy monster like dragons [duplicate]

Once again I am trying to find about a story I read decades ago in translation (I do not remember the title in Italian, either). The main topic was a world where genetic engineering had starter ...
5 votes
2 answers
313 views

Looking for a science fiction omnibus where one of the stories had mock combat games for political purposes

I read this story over twelve years ago. It was published with a lot of other stories (by the same author IIRC). The main story that I remember had to do with some kind of war games using pilots and ...
3 votes
1 answer
713 views

I'm looking for a book about an experiment a couple decided to do on their child to make him smarter

I'm looking for a book I read in the 90's...it was about an experiment a couple decided to do on their child to make him smarter. I think the child ended up being too smart or something but I remember ...
3 votes
1 answer
164 views

Book about modified plants destroying crops

Looking for a fiction book I read in the 1990s about plants that were genetically modified and somehow it got out and destroyed the crops. This was before we learned of GMO of today!
5 votes
1 answer
380 views

Book about a boy (man?) who was genetically modified by his father

I believe this book was published in the 1970s or 1980s. What I remember is that it was about a boy whose DNA was modified (using insect DNA?) before birth by his father, who was a genetic researcher. ...
24 votes
1 answer
6k views

Novel About a Girl Who Realizes She is a Clone [duplicate]

So I remember reading this book in the early 2000's, and I'm pretty sure it was placed in my classroom, so it was obviously geared toward young adults. It was about a girl who wakes up one day with a ...
13 votes
1 answer
374 views

sci fi story set in the future - An Olympic swimmer genetically modifies his daughter to have webbed fingers

It was a story set in the future, about an Olympic swimmer who genetically modifies his baby girl to get webbed fingers, so that she excels at swimming better than him. But, the girl, as she grows, ...
5 votes
1 answer
9k views

What was abnormal in Hanna's DNA?

In the movie Hanna (2011), DNA was manipulated by the CIA to create super-soldiers. In the this clip, we see at 00:55 a lab report marked "Abnormal". In the lower left-hand corner can be seen the ...
-9 votes
1 answer
603 views

What evidence supports the idea that Voldemort (or others) could use magic to develop witches/wizards with genetically engineered/enhanced abilities? [closed]

I am seeking additional supporting canon evidence for the idea that within the Potterverse, it would be potentially possible to use magic to genetically engineer/enhance witches/wizards to have ...
5 votes
2 answers
693 views

Short story with Genetically Modified pegasus made to order

I had this story in an anthology collection many years ago - the basic premise was that a company - Genetics Inc. (or something along those lines, which may be the title of the tale) were able to ...
9 votes
1 answer
351 views

Help Finding a Cool SciFi Story I Read As a High Schooler

I read quite a bit at my high school library when I was younger. I used to read various monthly anthologies of Science Fiction for the years I was at school. I read a cool space driven story about a ...