Mark D. Shriver | |
|---|---|
 Shriver in 2013 | |
| Alma mater | State University of New York University of Texas Health Science Center |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Population genetics |
| Institutions | Pennsylvania State University Morehouse College |
Mark D. Shriver is an American population geneticist. He leads genetic research at the Pennsylvania State University. [1]
Shriver studied Biology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, earning a B.S in 1987. He furthered his studies and earned a Ph.D. in Genetics at the University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston in 1993.
Shriver's work is focused on admixture mapping, [2] signatures of natural selection, and phenotypic variability in common trait variation. A major goal of his work is to apply these methods and understanding of genomic variation to studies of common diseases (e.g. obesity, type 2 diabetes, adaptation to altitude, hypertension and prostate cancer), and to normal variation, in particular skin pigmentation and response to UVR. More recently, his research has focused on the genetics of facial features. [3] [4] [5] [6]
Shriver has consulted for and appeared in several documentaries about ancestry, race, and recent human evolution. Most notably, he was featured in the 2006 PBS series African American Lives and the 2008 series African American Lives 2 (hosted by Henry Louis Gates) . He also appeared in the BBC Two film Motherland: A Genetic Journey (2003), the BBC documentary, "The Difference", French television's "Tracked Down by Our Genes" (2007), and UK Channel 4's "Human Mutants" (2004).
Shriver is a professor of genetics at the Pennsylvania State University in State College, Pennsylvania. From 2009 to 2010, he was on sabbatical as an associate professor of biology at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. In 2006, he was a visiting professor at both Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin.
Shriver has made public the discovery of his own recent West African ancestry (22%). [7] [8] In 2007, he married science writer and former broadcast meteorologist Katrina Voss.
A race is a categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society. The term came into common usage during the 16th century, when it was used to refer to groups of various kinds, including those characterized by close kinship relations. By the 17th century, the term began to refer to physical (phenotypical) traits, and then later to national affiliations. Modern science regards race as a social construct, an identity which is assigned based on rules made by society. While partly based on physical similarities within groups, race does not have an inherent physical or biological meaning. The concept of race is foundational to racism, the belief that humans can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another.
Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza was an Italian geneticist. He was a population geneticist who taught at the University of Parma, the University of Pavia and then at Stanford University.
Genetic genealogy is the use of genealogical DNA tests, i.e., DNA profiling and DNA testing, in combination with traditional genealogical methods, to infer genetic relationships between individuals. This application of genetics came to be used by family historians in the 21st century, as DNA tests became affordable. The tests have been promoted by amateur groups, such as surname study groups or regional genealogical groups, as well as research projects such as the Genographic Project.
Researchers have investigated the relationship between race and genetics as part of efforts to understand how biology may or may not contribute to human racial categorization.
"Human Genetic Diversity: Lewontin's Fallacy" is a 2003 paper by A. W. F. Edwards. He criticises an argument first made in Richard Lewontin's 1972 article "The Apportionment of Human Diversity", that the practice of dividing humanity into races is taxonomically invalid because any given individual will often have more in common genetically with members of other population groups than with members of their own. Edwards argued that this does not refute the biological reality of race since genetic analysis can usually make correct inferences about the perceived race of a person from whom a sample is taken, and that the rate of success increases when more genetic loci are examined.
In population genetics, an ancestry-informative marker (AIM) is a single-nucleotide polymorphism that exhibits substantially different frequencies between different populations. A set of many AIMs can be used to estimate the proportion of ancestry of an individual derived from each population.
Human genetic variation is the genetic differences in and among populations. There may be multiple variants of any given gene in the human population (alleles), a situation called polymorphism.
Harry Ostrer is a medical geneticist who investigates the genetic basis of common and rare disorders. In the diagnostic laboratory, he translates the findings of genetic discoveries into tests that can be used to identify people's risks for disease prior to occurrence, or for predicting its outcome once it has occurred. He is also known for his study, writing and lectures on the origins of the Jewish people.
Race and health refers to how being identified with a specific race influences health. Race is a complex concept that has changed across chronological eras and depends on both self-identification and social recognition. In the study of race and health, scientists organize people in racial categories depending on different factors such as: phenotype, ancestry, social identity, genetic makeup and lived experience. "Race" and ethnicity often remain undifferentiated in health research.
Rick Antonius Kittles is an American biologist specializing in human genetics and a Senior Vice President for Research at the Morehouse School of Medicine. He is of African-American ancestry, and achieved renown in the 1990s for his pioneering work in tracing the ancestry of African Americans via DNA testing.
DNAPrint Genomics was a genetics company with a wide range of products related to genetic profiling. They were the first company to introduce forensic and consumer genomics products, which were developed immediately upon the publication of the first complete draft of the human genome in the early 2000s. They researched, developed, and marketed the first ever consumer genomics product, based on "Ancestry Informative Markers" which they used to correctly identify the BioGeographical Ancestry (BGA) of a human based on a sample of their DNA. They also researched, developed and marketed the first ever forensic genomics product - DNAWITNESS - which was used to create a physical profile of donors of crime scene DNA. The company reached a peak of roughly $3M/year revenues but ceased operations in February 2009.
Stephen Wayne "Steve" Scherer is a Canadian scientist who studies genetic variation in human disease. He obtained his PhD at the University of Toronto under Professor Lap-chee Tsui. Together they founded Canada's first human genome centre, the Centre for Applied Genomics (TCAG) at the Hospital for Sick Children. He continues to serve as director of TCAG, and is also a University Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics, and the director of the McLaughlin Centre at the Temerty Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto.
The inhabitants of Latin America are from a variety of ancestries, ethnic groups and races, making the region one of the most diverse in the world. The specific composition of the group varies from country to country. Many have a predominance of European-Amerindian or Mestizo population; in others, Amerindians are a majority; some are dominated by inhabitants of European ancestry; and some countries' populations have large African or Mulatto populations.
Mark Stoneking is a geneticist currently working as the Group Leader of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, of Max Planck Gesellschaft at Leipzig, and Honorary Professor of Biological Anthropology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany. He works in the field of human evolution, especially the genetic evolution, origin and dispersal of modern humans. He, along with his doctoral advisor Allan Wilson and a fellow researcher Rebecca L. Cann, contributed to the Out of Africa Theory in 1987 by introducing the concept of Mitochondrial Eve, a hypothetical common mother of all living humans based on mitochondrial DNA.
Carlos D. Bustamante is a population geneticist and a professor at Stanford University.
Sarah Anne Tishkoff is an American geneticist and the David and Lyn Silfen Professor in the Department of Genetics and Biology at the University of Pennsylvania. She also serves as a director for the American Society of Human Genetics and is an associate editor at PLOS Genetics, G3, and Genome Research. She is also a member of the scientific advisory board at the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
Lluís Quintana-Murci is a French-Spanish biologist and population geneticist known for his research on human evolution, population genomic diversity and its relationship with immune diversity and infectious diseases.
Charmaine DM Royal is an American geneticist and Associate Professor at the Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy and the Department of African and African American Studies at Duke University. She studies the intersections of race, ethnicity, ancestry genetics, and health, especially as they pertain to historically marginalized and underrepresented groups in genetic and genomic research; and genomics and global health. Her major interest is in addressing root causes and implementing sustainable solutions regarding problems of race and racism in research, healthcare, and society. Royal is a Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) Independent Expert Committee (IEC) member appointed by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and is a 2020 Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Iowa.
Janina M. Jeff is a US-based geneticist and a senior scientist at Illumina. She is specifically interested in identifying genetic variants that explain disease disparities across populations, as well as science communication. She was the first African American to earn a PhD in Human Genetics at Vanderbilt University.
Neil Hanchard is a Jamaican physician and scientist who is clinical investigator in the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), where he leads the Childhood Complex Disease Genomics section. Prior to joining NHGRI, he was an associate professor of molecular and human genetics at the Baylor College of Medicine. He is a fellow of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics,. Hanchard's research focuses on the genetics of childhood disease, with an emphasis on diseases impacting global health.
| Authority control: Academics |
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