Altshuler is a self-described optimist, and sees promise in current genetic research that attempts to pinpoint why some people develop diseases like adult-onset diabetes or schizophrenia. If we can identify the precise mechanisms inside cells that go haywire in individuals with an inherited predisposition to a certain disease, then it may be possible to design drugs much more accurately. “We’re searching for a culprit who committed a crime, where the culprit is a mutation in a DNA sequence that made somebody get sick …. And scientists are the detectives -- CGI: Crime Gene Investigators,” says Altshuler.
About the Speaker
David Altshuler '86
Founding Member, and Director of the Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute Associate Professor, Genetics and Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Clinical endocrinologist and human geneticist David Altshuler is one of the world's leading scientists in the study of human genetic variation and its application to disease, using tools and information from the Human Genome Project. He is a lead investigator in The SNP Consortium and the International HapMap Project, public-private partnerships that have created public maps of human genome sequence variation as a foundation for disease research. Among his discoveries is the finding of a common genetic variant that increases the risk of contracting type 2 diabetes.
He received his B.S. in 1986 from MIT; a Ph.D. in 1993 from Harvard University, and an M.D. in 1994 from Harvard Medical School; he completed his internship, residency and clinical fellowship training at Massachusetts General Hospital.
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