Skip to main content
Premium Trial:

Request an Annual Quote

People in the News: Gail Herman, Matt Posard, More

Premium

Gail Herman has been elected president of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics, replacing Wayne Grody, who completed his two-year term. Additionally, Gerald Feldman will serve as president-elect during Herman's two-year term, and the ACMG also added several new members to its board.

Herman was a member of the ACMG's board of directors from 2001 to 2007. Herman is a professor in the department of pediatrics at Nationwide Children's Hospital and Ohio State University. She has also served as director of the Division and Center for Molecular and Human Genetics in the Department of Pediatrics. She holds an MD and PhD in biochemistry from Duke University.

The new board members ACMG named this week include Joel Charrow, who is the director of the division of genetics, birth defects, and metabolism and the genetics laboratory at the Children's Hospital of Chicago, and a professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University's Fienberg School of Medicine; Kristin Monaghan, who is director of the DNA diagnostic laboratory and a medical geneticist in the department of medical genetics at Henry Ford Hospital; Lorraine Potocki, a professor in the department of molecular and human genetics at Baylor College of Medicine and a consulting geneticist at the Texas Children's Hospital; Maren Scheuner, who is chief of medical genetics and director of health services genomics research at the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System and director of clinical genetic services for the Veterans Integrated Service Network 22; and Robert Steiner, who is a professor of pediatric research and a faculty member in molecular and medical genetics and cellular biosciences at Oregon Health and Science University.


Halozyme Therapeutics has appointed Matt Posard to its board of directors. Posard is currently senior vice president and general manager of Illumina's Translational and Consumer Genomics unit. Before joining Illumina, he held a variety of positions within product marketing at Gen-Probe, and oversaw marketing at Biosite. He holds a BA in quantitative economics and decision science from the University of California, San Diego.

The Scan

Positive Framing of Genetic Studies Can Spark Mistrust Among Underrepresented Groups

Researchers in Human Genetics and Genomics Advances report that how researchers describe genomic studies may alienate potential participants.

Small Study of Gene Editing to Treat Sickle Cell Disease

In a Novartis-sponsored study in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers found that a CRISPR-Cas9-based treatment targeting promoters of genes encoding fetal hemoglobin could reduce disease symptoms.

Gut Microbiome Changes Appear in Infants Before They Develop Eczema, Study Finds

Researchers report in mSystems that infants experienced an enrichment in Clostridium sensu stricto 1 and Finegoldia and a depletion of Bacteroides before developing eczema.

Acute Myeloid Leukemia Treatment Specificity Enhanced With Stem Cell Editing

A study in Nature suggests epitope editing in donor stem cells prior to bone marrow transplants can stave off toxicity when targeting acute myeloid leukemia with immunotherapy.