Provost Lecture - Itsik Pe'er: Sequencing the Ashkenazi Genome

Itsik Pe'er, who has a PhD in computer science from
Tel Aviv University, is an associate professor in the
Department of Computer Science and the Center
for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics
at Columbia University. His research involves
developing computational methods for analysis of
human genetic variation. The Ashkenazi Jewish
population, which comprises roughly 10 million
people today, has long been recognized as
genetically isolated and therefore advantageous for
genetic studies. Yet, only recently available highthroughput
genetic data and mathematical
modeling allowed reconstructing the demographic
history that led to this isolation. It appears that
Ashkenazi Jews descended from a very small group
as recently as the late medieval times, making
it possible to catalog genetic variation in this group.
In a collaborative effort across multiple New York
institutions, a catalog of complete Ashkenazi
genomes has been constructed. Pe'er will discuss
the findings and their implications.