The University of Miami’s newest visiting talent is a Harvard-educated population geneticist whose research not only focuses on genomics technology and its application in medicine, agriculture and evolutionary biology but on empowering policymakers to use the field of genomics and data science to improve human health and well-being.
Carlos D. Bustamante, founding chair and professor of the Department of Biomedical Data Science and professor of genetics and biology at Stanford University School of Medicine, will inaugurate his tenure as a UM Distinguished Presidential Scholar with lectures at four UM schools and colleges, including Arts and Sciences, Business, Law, and Medicine.
He will present “Bringing Down Health Care Costs by Genetic Study and Use of Big Data” on Monday, April 17 from 11 a.m. to noon at the Alma Jennings Foundation/Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz Study Center at the School of Business Administration’s Jenkins Building. The lecture is open to the University community and the public.
Later that day at 6:30 p.m. in LC 130 of the Whitten Learning Center, Bustamante, who was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2010, will present “Are We All Neanderthals? Population Genetics, Ancient DNA, and the Great Human Diasporas,” which is also open to the UM community and the public.
Bustamante, who is also founding director of the Stanford Center for Computational, Evolutionary, and Human Genomics, and focuses on reducing health disparities in genomics by broadening representation of understudied groups, will deliver four other talks in April as part of his Distinguished Presidential Scholar commitment. Those lectures include:
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“Genomics and the Law: Promises, Pitfalls, and Potential Solutions” on Tuesday, April 18 from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. at the School of Law Faculty Meeting Room on the fourth floor of the Law Library. The talk is open to the UM community.
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An “Ethics for Lunch” discussion with medical and science students on Wednesday, April 19 from noon to 1 p.m. at the Rosenstiel Medical Science Building (RMSB), room 2013, 1600 NW 10th Avenue, Miami, on the Miller School of Medicine This talk is for students only, and space is limited; interested students should RSVP to Kenneth Goodman, professor and director of the Institute for Bioethics and Health Policy and co-director of the UM Ethics Programs, at KGoodman@med.miami.edu.
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“Genomics for the World: Application of Next Generation Sequencing in Diverse Populations and Methods for Evaluating the Pathogenicity of Variants” on Thursday, April 20 from noon to 1 p.m. at the Don Soffer Clinical Research Center, Gordon Center First Floor Auditorium, 1120 NW 14th Street, on the Miller School
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“Barnyard Genomics: A Dog and Pony Show—Using Genomics to Improve Overall Canine and Equine Health, Performance, and Genetics” on Thursday, April 20 from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Cox Science Center, Room 126, on the Coral Gables campus. Open to the public and UM community.
Bustamante received a B.A. (1997), M.A. (2001), and Ph.D. (2001) from Harvard University. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Oxford (2001–2002). His scientific articles have appeared in such journals as Nature, Science, Molecular Biology and Evolution, PLoS Genetics, and PNAS.
