Abstract
The human microbiome, the microbes that colonize the human body, affect almost all aspects of human biology. Our understanding of the microbiome has exploded as DNA sequencing methods increased data production by orders of magnitude with a comparable decrease in cost. These advances are now being applied broadly in medicine as connections are sought between our microbes and health and diseases. Moreover, traditional infectious disease approaches are also being revolutionized by nucleotide-level tracking and characterization of pathogens. Together this is providing new insights into personal and public health.
About the speaker
Prof George Weinstock received his PhD in Microbiology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977 and did his postdoctoral research at Stanford University School of Medicine. He joined the US National Cancer Institute in 1980 and established the DNA Metabolism Section under the Laboratory of Recombinant DNA. He was faculty at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston from 1984 to 2001. He joined the Baylor College of Medicine in 1998 and was Professor of Molecular and Human Genetics. He moved to the Washington University in St. Louis in 2008, and is currently Professor of Genetics and Professor of Molecular Microbiology.
Prof Weinstock’s research interests focus on using genome analysis to connect genotype to phenotype and uncover fundamental biological principles. He applies high-throughput DNA sequencing, genome-wide analysis, bioinformatics, and other genetic methods to the study of human, model organisms and microbial genomes. His goal is to employ genetic and genomic thinking to important problems in biology. He led one of the first bacterial genome projects, sequencing Treponema pallidum, the causative agent of syphilis. He is now a leader of the Human Microbiome Project, studying the collection of microbes that colonize the human body. The goal of this work is to analyze the genomes of these organisms, characterize the communities they form, and measure how communities change in different health and disease states. He was one of the leaders of the Human Genome Project and also the first personal genome project, sequencing Dr James Watson’s genome using next-generation sequencing technology. He is now leading projects using next-generation sequencing to discover mutations causing human disease.
Prof Weinstock is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Microbiology.
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