Today's Globe: genetics-based products, cancer deaths, breast cancer and inflammation, dioxins, Lawrence A. Norton

Whether it is a new skin care product that promises to "reactivate" the youth in your genes or tests that offer nutrition advice tailored to your DNA, the age of consumer genetics is here. But as genetics spreads beyond the lab, scientists worry that companies are making overblown promises before the science is mature enough to meet public expectations - and that this could spark a backlash.

The US cancer death rate fell again in 2006, a new analysis shows, continuing a slow downward trend that specialists attribute to declines in smoking, earlier detection, and better treatment.

Testing for signs of inflammation in the blood might help doctors better predict which women are at greatest risk of dying from breast cancer, US researchers said yesterday.

The federal government will speed up a long-delayed assessment of how dioxins affect human health, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency head said yesterday.

Several years into treating patients as a general practitioner, Dr. Lawrence A. Norton set aside the comfort of an established office in a small town and returned to school, where he specialized in dermatology. Dr. Norton, who had been putting the finishing touches on a history he wrote of the Dedham Country and Polo Club, died May 13 in Newton-Wellesley Hospital after suffering cardiac arrest while golfing. He was 78 and had lived in Dedham for 38 years.