Advisory Board

Bob Waterston, MD, PhD

Bob Waterston, MD, PhD, is a Professor of Genome Sciences and Medical Genetics at University of Washington where he was the Department Chair of Genome Sciences from 2002 to 2019. His research includes working with the Sanger Institute to complete the first genomic sequence of C. elegans. These efforts were followed by his work on the Human Genome Project, which was completed in April 2003. At UW, Dr. Waterston’s work has centered around research and education in genetics, genomics, proteomics and computational biology. His primary laboratory focuses on the exploring ways to contribute to the understanding of human and the nematode worm, C. elegans, genomes.

Bartha Maria Knoppers, PhD

Bartha Maria Knoppers, PhD, (Comparative Medical Law), is a Full Professor, Canada Research Chair in Law and Medicine and Director of the Centre of Genomics and Policy of the Faculty of Medicine at McGill University. She was the Chair of the Ethics and Governance Committee of the International Cancer Genome Consortium (2009-2017). She is currently Chair of the Ethics Advisory Panel of WADA (2015- ), and is Co-Chair of the Regulatory and Ethics Workstream of the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (2013- ). In 2007, she founded the international Population Project in Genomics and Society (P3G) and CARTaGENE Québec’s population biobank (20,000 indiv.). Dr. Knoppers is an expert on the ethical aspects of genomics, genetics and biotechnology.

Pavel Pevzner, PhD

Pavel Pevzner, PhD, is the Ronald R. Taylor Chair and Distinguished Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at University of California, San Diego, where he directs the NIH Center for Computational Mass Spectrometry. He holds Ph.D. from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in Russia. His research focuses on genome sequencing, immunoproteogenomics, antibiotics sequencing, comparative genomics and computational technologies. He is known for creating applications that allow scientists to solve biological problems. He was named Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor in 2006. He was elected to the Association for Computing Machinery Fellow (2010) for “contribution to algorithms for genome rearrangements, DNA sequencing, and proteomics.”

Matt Lebo, PhD, FACMG

Matt Lebo, PhD, FACMG, joined Partners Personalized Medicine as an Assistant Laboratory Director for the Laboratory for Molecular Medicine in 2011 following the completion of his ABMG molecular genetics fellowship training at the Harvard Medical School Genetics Training Program. Dr. Lebo became the head of Bioinformatics at Partners Personalized Medicine and Associate Laboratory Director for the Laboratory for Molecular Medicine in the fall of 2013. In 2018, he became the Director of the Laboratory for Molecular Medicine.

Sandra Soo-Jin Lee, Ph.D

Sandra Soo-Jin Lee, Ph.D is Chief of the Division of Ethics and faculty in the Department of Medical Humanities and Ethics at Columbia University. Dr. Lee leads NIH funded multidisciplinary studies of the sociocultural dimensions and ethical issues in genomics, precision medicine, artificial intelligence and team science, with a focus on race, diversity and equity. She is Co-Principal Investigator of the CERA, the Center for the Ethical, Legal and Social Implications Resources and Analysis and is a Hastings Center Fellow. Dr. Lee currently serves on both the Scientific and Bioethics Advisory Boards of the Kaiser Permanente National Research Biobank and the NIH/NHGRI Genomics and Society Working Group. Dr. Lee received her doctorate from the UC Berkeley/UCSF joint program in Medical Anthropology and her undergraduate degree in Human Biology from Stanford University.

Deanna Church, PhD

Deanna Church, PhD, is currently, the Senior Director of Mammalian Applications at Inscripta, Inc. Her previous work included Senior Director of Software Applications at 10X Genomics where she led a team of multidisciplinary scientists focused on improving genome and Senior Director of Genome Content at Personalis, Inc, where she led a team focusing on genome analysis and variant interpretation. Prior to working in the biotech industry, Dr. Church was a senior member of NCBI where her work focused on the coordinating of variation resources, helping build the human and mouse reference assemblies, and building infrastructure for web-based genome analysis tools. She has more than 35 publications, many of which focus on the human reference.

Martin Hirst

Martin Hirst, is a Senior Scientist and Head of Epigenomics at Canada’s Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre at BC Cancer, Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and Associate Director of the Michael Smith Laboratory at the University of British Columbia (UBC). His research focuses on understanding epigenetic dysfunction in cancer by developing experimental and computational tools. Over the last decade, he has led epigenomic research program at BC Cancer and UBC. He also leads the Centre of Epigenomic Mapping Technologies (CEMT) that represents one of two Canadian epigenomic mapping centres funded by the Canadian Epigenetics, Environment and Health Research Consortium (CEEHRC).