UW Genome Sciences

Model Organism Genetics -- Human and Medical Genetics -- Genomics and Proteomics -- Computational Biology

GS Symposium | 9/19

The Interplay of Technology and Biology

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Nunn Lab

Harmful algal blooms are preceded by a predictable and quantifiable shift in the oceanic microbiome

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Eichler Lab

Complete sequencing of ape genomes

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Beliveau and Noble Labs

Predicting cell cycle stage from 3D single-cell nuclear-stained images

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NAS Public Welfare Medal

Mary-Claire King to receive NAS Public Welfare Medal

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Stergachis Lab

Synchronized long-read genome, methylome, epigenome and transcriptome profiling resolve a Mendelian condition

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Nobel Prize

David Baker has been awarded the Nobel Prize.

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Upcoming Events

September 8-10
Department Retreat

Friday, September 19
Genome Sciences Symposium: The Interplay of Technology and Biology | in honor of Stan Fields
all day | Foege Auditorium

Graduate Program Information Sessions:
Tuesday, 10/7/25, 10:00 a.m. (pacific time)
Thursday, 10/23/25, 2:00 p.m. (pacific time)
Sessions will be held via Zoom. Please register here.

Nobel Prize

David Baker has been awarded the Nobel Prize.

New Faculty

Genome Sciences is pleased to announce that Dr. Saori Sakaue has accepted our offer to join the department as an assistant professor. Dr. Sakaue received her MD/PhD from the University of Tokyo, where she worked on genetic analyses of global biobanks. She conducted postdoctoral research with Soumya Raychaudhuri at Harvard, focusing on developing single-cell genomics tools to understand the role of genetic variants in gene regulation. Her lab will focus on developing and using statistical genetics tools to integrate molecular data for understanding disease mechanisms, ultimately addressing clinical challenges for future patients.

Genome Sciences is pleased to announce that Dr. William DeWitt has accepted our offer to join the department as an assistant professor. Dr. DeWitt was a graduate student with Kelley Harris and Frederick Matsen in Genome Sciences and the Fred Hutch Cancer Center, and a postdoctoral fellow with Yun Song at the University of California, Berkeley. Throughout his career, he has tackled computational and theoretical problems in evolutionary dynamics and quantitative immunology. His lab will pursue work in probabilistic and dynamical modeling, statistical inference, and machine learning, all grounded by questions about evolving biological systems.

Department News

Nasa Sinnott-Armstrong has been named a Pew Biomedical Scholar.

Caleb Carr and Jenny Nathans have been awarded NRSA Fellowships.

Maggie Russell has received the UW Graduate School’s Distinguished Dissertation Award.

Alison Feder has received the SMBE 2025 Early-Career Excellence Award.

Leah Anderson has received the best talk award at the 2025 Pacific Northwest Yeast Club Meeting.

Leah Anderson and Elliott Swanson have received the 2025 Sonia Ting Travel Award.

Lara Muffley has been awarded the UW Distinguished Staff Award for Collaboration.

Lizzie Plender is featured on the ASHG Trainee Excellence Spotlight Podcast.

Hannah Jordt (faculty), Deanna Plubell (postdoc), Sandra Pennington (staff), and Leah Anderson (student) have received the UW Genome Sciences Department Outstanding Service Award.

Introducing the 2025 Incoming Class:

Yuanye Chi - Tufts University / Jackson Lab
Max Dippel – UW / Boston University / Benaroya Research Institute
Kyra Fetter - UC San Diego
John Gourdeau - Dartmouth / Manifold Biotechnologies
Saksham Gupta - India Institute of Technology, Kanpur / FHCC
Michelle Johnson - Harvey Mudd College / Caltech
Allie Kreitman – UW MSTP
Tiger Lao - UC Santa Barbara / Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
Kayla Ly - UC Irvine
Valerie Lynch – University of Texas / UW Genome Sciences
Chris Oliveira – UW MSTP
Monica Padilla Galvez - National Autonomous University of Mexico / FHCC
Katrina Peterson - Northwestern University
Olivia Weissenfels - UW / Johns Hopkins
Morgan Wu – UW MSTP

Chris McGann and Bo Wen have received graduate student awards at the 2025 ASMS Conference.

Celeste Berg has been named an AAAS Fellow.

Abby McGee, Michelle Johnson, and Val Browning have been awarded NSF Fellowships. Matt Chaw, Marazzano Colon, Bria Metzger, Rachel Powell, and Catherine Sniezek have received honorable mention.

Syd Sattler has received the first place travel award for best graduate student talk at the Northwest Developmental Biology Conference.

Connor Finkbeiner has been awarded an NRSA Fellowship.

Alison Feder has received the Early Career Achievement in STEM award from Seattle AWIS.

Xavi Guitart / General Molecular Electronics has been awarded second place at the UW Hollomon Health Innovation Challenge.

Mary-Claire King to receive NAS Public Welfare Medal

Mapping Genetic Variants and Their Ties to Disease.

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Alumni

Diversity

Events Calendar

Graduate Program

Postdoctoral Program

Support Our Research

Covid Research

The Department of Genome Sciences is committed to creating an environment that is welcoming and inclusive. Our goal is to foster a place of learning and working where all members can thrive and where diversity is recognized and celebrated. At Genome Sciences, we aim to create supportive spaces for those who are marginalized in higher education or society. To achieve this, we recognize that it is our ongoing responsibility to understand, acknowledge, and challenge systems of privilege and disadvantage in higher education such as those based on race, color, creed, caste, religion, national origin, citizenship, sex, age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disability, veteran status, or socioeconomic status.

Genome Sciences mourns the loss of our colleague, Dr. Deborah Nickerson.

Recent Research Highlights

Lineage-resolved analysis of embryonic gene expression evolution in C. elegans and C. briggsae
Connor Kubo, former grad Chris Large, and current and former Waterston Lab members are authors on a paper in Science.
Accelerating Biomolecular Modeling with AtomWorks and RF3
IPD members, including GS grad student Yash Sonthalia, are authors on a paper posted on bioRxiv.
Complex genetic variation in nearly complete human genomes
Former Eichler Lab member Glennis Logsdon is lead author, along with current and former Eichler Lab members David Porubsky, DongAhn Yoo, Katy Munson, Kendra Hoekzema, Arvis Sulovari and William Harvey, on a paper in Nature.
Gene clusters linked to insulin resistance identified in a genome-wide study of the Taiwan Biobank population
Noble Lab member Eugene Lin is lead author on a paper in Nature Communications.
Harmful algal blooms are preceded by a predictable and quantifiable shift in the oceanic microbiome
Miranda Mudge is lead author on a paper in Nature Communications.

UW Daily
Population size interacts with reproductive longevity to shape the germline mutation rate
Current and former Harris Lab members Luke Zhu and Annabel Beichman are lead authors on a paper in PNAS.
Human de novo mutation rates from a four-generation pedigree reference
Current and former Eichler Lab members David Porubsky, Michelle Noyes, and Glennis Logston are lead authors on a paper in Nature.
UW News
Protein signatures predict coral resilience and survival to thermal bleaching events
Nunn Lab members are lead authors on a paper in Nature Communications Earth & Environment.
UW News
A transformer model for de novo sequencing of data-independent acquisition mass spectrometry data
Justin Sanders and Bo Wen are lead authors, along with other MacCoss and Noble Lab members, on paper to be published in Nature Methods.
Complete sequencing of ape genomes
DongAhn Yoo, a postdoc in the Eichler lab, led an effort of 123 scientists from 64 labs from around the world to completely sequence and annotate 6 non-human ape genomes, on a paper in Nature.

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