Mapping the genetic architecture of polygenic disease, complex traits, and gene expression levels

The Amariuta Lab sometimes has bandwidth to take on talented undergraduate students with research or course experience in bioinformatics and statistical data analysis. We have a variety of predefined projects but are also open to student-led projects and ideas that fall within the general scope of research in our lab. These projects generally involve mapping the genetic component of gene expression and, separately, complex traits and polygenic diseases, in order to identify putative disease-critical genes that could serve as predictive biomarkers or therapeutic targets. All projects are in the area of statistical and population genetics, aiming to understand population-specific and shared genetic effects across diverse cell types and tissues, via the integration of high dimensional genomic data with globally diverse DNA sequence (genotyping) and disease data (phenotyping).