Rewriting Human History and Empowering Indigenous Communities with Genome Editing Tools - Keolu Fox
Channel: Guillaume LEVRIER
Date: 2021-02-26

Prof. Keolu Fox presenting at Sciences Po CEVIPOF's Séminaire Général

February 23 - 2021 at 8AM PST - 5 PM CET

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Keolu Fox Ph.D., Kānaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) is an assistant professor at University of California, San Diego, affiliated with the Department of Anthropology, the Global Health Program, the Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute, the Climate Action Lab, and the Indigenous Futures Lab. He holds a Ph.D. in Genome Sciences from the University of Washington, Seattle (2016). Dr. Fox’s multi-disciplinary research interests include genome sequencing, genome engineering, computational biology, evolutionary genetics, paleogenetics, and Indigenizing biomedical research. His primary research focuses on questions of functionalizing genomics, testing theories of natural selection by editing genes and determining the functions of mutations.

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Rewriting Human History and Empowering Indigenous Communities with Genome Editing Tools 
Keolu Fox, Kartik Lakshmi Rallapalli, Alexis C Komor 

 Appropriate empirical-based evidence and detailed theoretical considerations should be used for evolutionary explanations of phenotypic variation observed in the field of human population genetics (especially Indigenous populations). Investigators within the population genetics community frequently overlook the importance of these criteria when associating observed phenotypic variation with evolutionary explanations. A functional investigation of population-specific variation using cutting-edge genome editing tools has the potential to empower the population genetics community by holding “just-so” evolutionary explanations accountable. Here, we detail currently available precision genome editing tools and methods, with a particular emphasis on base editing, that can be applied to functionally investigate population-specific point mutations. We use the recent identification of thrifty mutations in the CREBRF gene as an example of the current dire need for an alliance between the fields of population genetics and genome editing.

Available open access at PMC7016644