The Search for a Hero Gene: Fact or Fiction

The radical entry of heroism research into scientific inquiry presents interesting challenges and possibilities for the study of heroism and the human condition more broadly. This „final frontier‟ of the enduring phenomenon of heroism stands to offer remarkable, unprecedented, and controversial advances in our understanding of heroic and human behaviour. Is a genetic basis for heroism a real possibility? If so, what would its impacts be? Advances in genomics and increased interest in the fields of epigenetics and neuroplasticity might hold the key to its discovery. This article considers some of the leading emerging research in global health genomics and speculations in the scientific study of heroism, and its potential interrelationship with genetic and epigenetic well-being.