(This opinion essay was first published in The Scientist on August 1, 2021.)

Genetic knowledge has played a direct role in pregnancy for more than 50 years, since the first use of amniocentesis to extract amniotic fluid containing fetal cells and DNA for analysis. Noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT)—which is significantly cheaper than amniocentesis and, requiring only a blood draw, can be done earlier in pregnancy—started a decade ago and is now common. NIPT will only become better, providing more-accurate information on risk for thousands of rare genetic conditions and dozens of more-common diseases. It’s just one of the technologies poised to transform pregnancy over the coming decades.

(Continue reading the opinion essay on the The Scientist’s page here.)