ISB News

Genome fingerprinting

Genome Comparison Easier with ‘Fingerprint’ Method

ISB researchers have developed a method of capturing a personal genome as a “fingerprint,” which will have a major impact on how quickly and efficiently genome sequences are compared.

‘Scientific American’ Quotes ISB Scientist

Scientific American published an article on the human olfactory system and quoted ISB principal scientist Gustavo Glusman: “Different species specialize in smelling different things, and it’s therefore very hard to compare [them] meaningfully,” Glusman explains. He also points out the brain’s plasticity. “It is well known that when one function is lost, other functions become more nuanced,” such as increased hearing ability after vision loss. Read More

Lena Joesch-Cohen

ISB Undergrad Intern Publishes Paper in Journal

Congratulations to Lena Joesch-Cohen (pictured above), who was one of ISB’s 2016 summer undergrad interns, just published a paper on the project she completed with Gustavo Glusman (Principal Scientist, Hood Lab). “Differences between the genomes of lymphoblastoid cell lines and blood-derived samples” was published on Feb. 23, 2017, in Dove Press. In a recommendation letter that Gustavo wrote to support Lena, he said this: “Lena is an outstanding scholar. Despite…

INTEGRATED VARIANTS FROM 13,000 COMPLETE GENOMES AVAILABLE TO PUBLIC IN KAVIAR DATABASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE SEATTLE, WA and FALLS CHURCH, VA, Sept. 23, 2015—The Institute for Systems Biology (ISB) and the Inova Translational Medicine Institute (ITMI) announced today a new release of Kaviar, the most comprehensive collection of human genomic variants currently available to the public. This release expands on the January 2015 release most notably by the addition of 3842 whole genome sequences provided by ITMI. Inova, a not-for-profit healthcare system…

Gustavo Glusman Promoted to Principal Scientist

By Dr. Lee Hood June 19, 2015 – It is an enormous delight for me to announce that Gustavo Glusman has been promoted to Principal Scientist. This is a new position that requires significant scientific accomplishments, a proven ability to raise money for one’s science and a commitment to the cross-disciplinary, open and participatory philosophy of the Institute. Gustavo fulfills these requirements in spades. He joins Monica Orellana and Kai…

ISB Releases Kaviar, World’s Largest Public Catalog of Human Genomic Variation

3 Bullets: Kaviar is ISB’s comprehensive catalog of human genomic variation Kaviar combines 31 data sources for a total of 151 million single nucleotide variants (SNVs), covering 5% of all the positions in the human genome A researcher studying possible disease-causing variants can use Kaviar to answer the question, “Have these variants been observed before, and if so, how often?” By Terry Farrah A typical pair of human genomes are…