Coffee or beer? The choice could affect your genome

Coffee and beer are polar opposites in the beverage world -- coffee picks you up, and beer winds you down. Now researchers have discovered that the beverages may also have opposite effects on your genome. Working with a kind of yeast that shares many important genetic similarities with humans, the researchers found that caffeine shortens and alcohol lengthens telomeres -- the end points of chromosomal DNA, implicated in aging and cancer.