VOLUME 12, NUMBER 11 • DECEMBER 8, 2000

"What Are We Learning from the Genome Project?"

At a special Centennial Cohn Forum on Mon., Dec. 18, David Botstein, a geneticist at Stanford University School of Medicine, will discuss what researchers are learning from the human genome sequence. Last June, the international Human Genome Project and Celera Genomics Corporation announced the completion of a "working draft" of the human genome sequence–the genetic code that carries the instructions allowing us to develop, grow and live. Scientists can now begin to understand the secrets of life processes to an extraordinary degree, personalizing medicine and offering clues to the differences–and remarkable similarities–among us.

Botstein’s research has centered on genetics, especially the use of genetic methods to understand biological functions. He began his theoretical contributions on linkage mapping of the human genome in 1980 by suggesting, with collaborators, that restriction fragment length polymorphisms (RFLPs) could be used to produce a linkage map of the human genome and to map the genes that cause disease in humans. His current research activities include studies of yeast genetics and cell biology, linkage mapping of human genes predisposing to manic-depressive illness, hypertension and other complex diseases, and the development and maintenance (with J. Michael Cherry) of the Saccharomyces Genome Database on the World Wide Web (www-genome.stanford.edu).

Botstein was educated at Harvard (A.B., 1963) and the University of Michigan (Ph.D., 1967). He joined the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he rose through the ranks from instructor to professor of genetics. In 1987, he moved to Genentech, Inc. as vice president—science, and in 1990 he became Stanford W. Ascherman, M.D., Professor and chairman of the Department of Genetics at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 1981 and to the Institute of Medicine in 1993, Botstein has won several awards, notably the Eli Lilly Award in Microbiology (1978), the Genetics Society of America Medal (1988) and the Allen Award of the American Society of Human Genetics (1989). He served on many policy-making and peer-review committees, most recently the NAS/NRC study on the Human Genome Project (1987-1988), the NIH Program Advisory Panel on the Human Genome (1989-1990) and the Advisory Council of the National Center for Human Genome Research (1990-1995).

The Cohn Forum is a series of colloquia on issues in health and biomedicine. The Cohn Forum’s Web site is: www.rockefeller.edu/pubinfo/cohn.html.

The Cohn Forum takes place at 6 p.m. in Caspary Auditorium and is precede by sherry in the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Lounge at 5:30 p.m. All are welcome