Ramachandran Lab
Principal Investigator: Sohini Ramachandran
Institution: Brown University (Providence, RI)
Primary Subfield: Genetics/Genomics
Recruitment Status: ✅ Accepting PhD Students ✅ Hiring Postdocs
Research Focus
PROJECT SUMMARY. The PI’s research program in human population genetics focuses on the coalescent-based inference of popula- tion histories from whole genomes, and identifying the genetic basis of adaptation and disease at multiple bio- logical scales—from mutations to genes to gene subnetworks. Global investments made in biobanks sampling millions of people around the world are revealing new challenges for human genetics. Biobanks demonstrate how ubiquitous genetic admixture—gene flow between previously isolated populations resulting in a population that is descended from multiple sources—has been throughout human history, yet methods for detecting genetic targets of natural selection are not calibrated for admixture. Relatives are increasingly sampled in biobanks, but are routinely discarded in population-genetic analyses, thereby limiting understanding of both recent population histories and complex trait architecture. Biobank participants are affected by heterogeneous environmental ex- posures, which confound our understanding of genetic influences on complex traits. Addressing these challenges requires new methods in human population genetics, the study of the evolutionary for…
Active NIH Awards
- 5R35GM139628-07: Population-genetic methods for inferring recent histories and targets of selection in the biobank era (2026)
- 2R35GM139628-06: Population-genetic methods for inferring recent histories and targets of selection in the biobank era (2025)
- 5R35GM139628-05: Novel population-genetic methods for localizing targets of natural selection in diverse human genomes (2025)
- 5R35GM139628-04: Novel population-genetic methods for localizing targets of natural selection in diverse human genomes (2024)
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