Founded | 1930 |
---|---|
93-6023830 [1] | |
Location |
|
Method | Journals, symposiums, education, and membership. [1] |
Members | 5,500+ |
Mariana Wolfner | |
Tracey de Pellegrin | |
Revenue (2013) | $3,950,041 [1] |
Expenses (2013) | $3,463,720 [1] |
Endowment | $26,756 [1] |
Employees (2013) | 0 [1] |
Volunteers (2013) | 14 [1] |
Website | www |
The Genetics Society of America (GSA) is a scholarly membership society of more than 5,500 genetics researchers and educators, established in 1931. The Society was formed from the reorganization of the Joint Genetics Sections of the American Society of Zoologists and the Botanical Society of America. [2]
GSA members conduct fundamental and applied research using a wide variety of model organisms to enhance understanding of living systems. Some of the systems of study include Drosophila (fruit flies), Caenorhabditis elegans (nematode roundworms), yeasts, zebrafish, humans, mice, bacteria, Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress), maize (corn), Chlamydomonas (green algae), Xenopus (frogs), and other animals, plants, and fungi.
GSA serves an international community of scientists who use genetics to make new discoveries and improve lives. [3] Its mission is to cultivate an inclusive, diverse research community that engages with the public, communicates the excitement and implications of discovery, and serves as an authoritative source of information. Its activities include:
The GSA advocates funding of research in genetics, primarily through its membership in the Coalition for the Life Sciences (CLS), Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), Research!America, and American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS). These organizations of leading scientists fosters public policies to advance basic biological research and its applications in medicine and other fields. The GSA also strives to inform state and national legislators about advances and issues in genetics.
The GSA organizes and sponsors several conferences for researchers (see below). [4] These include the long-running model organism meetings: Yeast (biennial), C. elegans (biennial), Fungal (biennial) and Drosophila (annual). It has also established the Population, Evolutionary, and Quantitative Genetics Conference (PEQG, biennial) and its flagship meeting The Allied Genetics Conference (TAGC, every four years).
The GSA publishes GENETICS , the leading journal for geneticists since the first issue in 1916, and G3: Genes|Genomes|Genetics , an open-access journal publishing high-quality fundamental research in genetics and genomics.
The GSA's Education Committee seeks to facilitate the integration of advances in genetics in the K through college curriculum. The GSA communicates to the public advances in genetics and answers to issues by providing expert opinion to the press and others.
GSA publishes two peer-edited scientific journals:
In 2013, the Society announced an editorial partnership with the American Society for Cell Biology to collaborate on the publication of journal CBE–Life Sciences Education . [5]
GSA organizes a number of scientific meetings, including many focused on model organisms of use in genetic studies.
In 2016, the Society co-located several of these meetings for The Allied Genetics Conference (TAGC). [6] Intended to be held every four years, the 2020 TAGC conference was held virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic. [7] [8]
The Genetics Society of America recognizes outstanding geneticists with following awards:
Source: GSA
A model organism is a non-human species that is extensively studied to understand particular biological phenomena, with the expectation that discoveries made in the model organism will provide insight into the workings of other organisms. Model organisms are widely used to research human disease when human experimentation would be unfeasible or unethical. This strategy is made possible by the common descent of all living organisms, and the conservation of metabolic and developmental pathways and genetic material over the course of evolution.
A genetic screen or mutagenesis screen is an experimental technique used to identify and select individuals who possess a phenotype of interest in a mutagenized population. Hence a genetic screen is a type of phenotypic screen. Genetic screens can provide important information on gene function as well as the molecular events that underlie a biological process or pathway. While genome projects have identified an extensive inventory of genes in many different organisms, genetic screens can provide valuable insight as to how those genes function.
Alfred Henry Sturtevant was an American geneticist. Sturtevant constructed the first genetic map of a chromosome in 1911. Throughout his career he worked on the organism Drosophila melanogaster with Thomas Hunt Morgan. By watching the development of flies in which the earliest cell division produced two different genomes, he measured the embryonic distance between organs in a unit which is called the sturt in his honor. On February 13, 1968, Sturtevant received the 1967 National Medal of Science from President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Nature Protocols, published by the Nature Publishing Group, is an on-line scientific journal publishing methods in a recipe-style format. The journal was launched in June 2006 and the content includes both classical methods and cutting-edge techniques relevant to the study of biological problems. The content on this site is divided into "Nature Protocols" and the "Protocol Exchange".
The GAL4-UAS system is a biochemical method used to study gene expression and function in organisms such as the fruit fly. It is based on the finding by Hitoshi Kakidani and Mark Ptashne, and Nicholas Webster and Pierre Chambon in 1988 that Gal4 binding to UAS sequences activates gene expression. The method was introduced into flies by Andrea Brand and Norbert Perrimon in 1993 and is considered a powerful technique for studying the expression of genes. The system has two parts: the Gal4 gene, encoding the yeast transcription activator protein Gal4, and the UAS, an enhancer to which GAL4 specifically binds to activate gene transcription.
Neurogenetics studies the role of genetics in the development and function of the nervous system. It considers neural characteristics as phenotypes, and is mainly based on the observation that the nervous systems of individuals, even of those belonging to the same species, may not be identical. As the name implies, it draws aspects from both the studies of neuroscience and genetics, focusing in particular how the genetic code an organism carries affects its expressed traits. Mutations in this genetic sequence can have a wide range of effects on the quality of life of the individual. Neurological diseases, behavior and personality are all studied in the context of neurogenetics. The field of neurogenetics emerged in the mid to late 20th century with advances closely following advancements made in available technology. Currently, neurogenetics is the center of much research utilizing cutting edge techniques.
Genetically modified animals are animals that have been genetically modified for a variety of purposes including producing drugs, enhancing yields, increasing resistance to disease, etc. The vast majority of genetically modified animals are at the research stage while the number close to entering the market remains small.
The American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG), founded in 1948, is a professional membership organization for specialists in human genetics. As of 2009, the organization had approximately 8,000 members. The society's members include researchers, academicians, clinicians, laboratory practice professionals, genetic counselors, nurses, and others who have a special interest in the field of human genetics.
Allan C. Spradling is an American scientist and principal investigator at the Carnegie Institution for Science and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute who studies egg development in the model organism, Drosophila melanogaster, a fruit fly. He is considered a leading researcher in the developmental genetics of the fruit fly egg and has developed a number of techniques in his career that have led to greater understanding of fruit fly genetics including contributions to sequencing its genome. He is also an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University and at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
Ira Herskowitz was an American phage and yeast geneticist who studied genetic regulatory circuits and mechanisms. He was particularly noted for his work on mating type switching and cellular differentiation, largely using Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a model organism.
Richard K. Wilson is a leading American molecular geneticist. He is the founding Executive Director of the Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital and Professor of Pediatrics at the Ohio State University College of Medicine. He received his A.B. degree (Microbiology) from Miami University in Ohio in 1981, his Ph.D. (Chemistry) from the University of Oklahoma in 1986, and was a Research Fellow in the Division of Biology at the California Institute of Technology (1986-1990). In 1990, Dr. Wilson joined the faculty of Washington University School of Medicine where he co-founded the Genome Sequencing Center/McDonnell Genome Institute. At Washington University, Dr. Wilson was the Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Professor of Genetics, Professor of Molecular Microbiology, and a member of the Senior Leadership Committee of the Siteman Cancer Center.
A geneticist is a biologist or physician who studies genetics, the science of genes, heredity, and variation of organisms. A geneticist can be employed as a scientist or a lecturer. Geneticists may perform general research on genetic processes or develop genetic technologies to aid in the pharmaceutical or and agriculture industries. Some geneticists perform experiments in model organisms such as Drosophila, C. elegans, zebrafish, rodents or humans and analyze data to interpret the inheritance of biological traits. A basic science geneticist is a scientist who usually has earned a PhD in genetics and undertakes research and/or lectures in the field. A medical geneticist is a physician who has been trained in medical genetics as a specialization and evaluates, diagnoses, and manages patients with hereditary conditions or congenital malformations; and provides genetic risk calculations and mutation analysis.
Philip William Ingham FRS, FMedSci, Hon. FRCP is a British geneticist, currently the Toh Kian Chui Distinguished Professor at the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, a partnership between Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and Imperial College, London. Previously, he was the inaugural Director of the Living Systems Institute at the University of Exeter, UK and prior to that was Vice Dean, Research at the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine.
The Drosophila Research Conference, informally known as "the fly meeting", is an annual meeting of Drosophila researchers held in North America since 1958. It is the principal research gathering for "Drosophilists", and is international in scope, drawing 1500 participants in a typical year. The conference is sponsored by the Genetics Society of America (GSA).
Brenda Jean Andrews is a Canadian academic, researcher and biologist specializing in systems biology and molecular genetics.
Anne Villeneuve is an American geneticist. She is known for her work on the mechanisms governing chromosome inheritance during sexual reproduction. Her work focuses on meiosis, the process by which a diploid organism, having two sets of chromosomes, produces gametes with only one set of chromosomes. She is a Professor of Developmental Biology and of Genetics at Stanford University and a member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Marian Bille Carlson is a geneticist and the Director of Life Sciences at the Simons Foundation. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a past president of the Genetics Society of America.
Susan E. Celniker is an American biologist, a staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and an adjunct professor Comparative Biochemistry department at UC Berkeley. She is the co-director of the Berkeley Drosophila Genome Project.