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30th Anniversary of the Human Genome Project

Interviews with genomics leaders

October 2020 marks the 30th anniversary of the beginning of the Human Genome Project (HGP). To commemorate this historic milestone, NHGRI’s History of Genomics Program is featuring 30 oral history interviews with prominent genomics experts relevant to the HGP and the broader field of genomics. This collection includes interviews with HGP architects, government officials who managed the HGP and researchers who actively contributed to the HGP’s success. We will feature one oral history per week for 30 consecutive weeks, culminating on Oct. 1, 2020.

Heidi Rehm

Heidi L. Rehm, Ph.D., is a human geneticist and genomic medicine researcher. She is the medical director of the Clinical Research Sequencing Platform and an institute member at the Broad Institute and the chief genomics officer in the Department of Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). She is also a professor of pathology at MGH, Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) and Harvard Medical School. She is a board-certified geneticist and leader in defining standards for the interpretation of sequence variants and a principal investigator of a major NIH-funded effort called ClinGen (Clinical Genome Resource), providing free and publicly accessible resources to support the interpretation of genes and variants. Rehm also co-leads the Broad Center for Mendelian Genomics with Daniel MacArthur focused on discovering novel rare disease genes and co-leads the Matchmaker Exchange to aid in gene discovery. In her interview, she discusses various aspects of genomic medicine and some of the challenges associated with the clinical implementation of genomics. She also discusses her involvement in the ClinGen and All of Us programs.

Last updated: Ocotober 20, 2020