Listing of news from the Institute of Bioinformatics at University of Georgia
Wayland Yeung of Dr. Natarajan Kannan’s lab has successfully defended his dissertation titled, “Traditional representation learning approaches for protein sequence analysis” on Friday, April 15, 2022. Congratulations Dr. Yeung!
Yuan Feng of Dr. Shaying Zhao’s lab has successfully defended his dissertation, “Canine MHC-I Genotyping and Diversity Landscape” on Wednesday, April 13, 2022. Congratulations Dr. Feng!
Michael Skaro of Dr. Jonathan Arnold’s lab had successfully defended his dissertation, “Applications of machine learning in omics and computer vision” on Monday, April 11, 2022. Congratulations Dr. Skaro!
(L to R) Patricia Yager, Jessica Kissinger, James E. Byers.
Three University of Georgia faculty have been named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
In a tradition stretching back to 1874, these individuals are elected annually by the AAAS Council for their extraordinary achievements leading to the advancement of science. Fellows must have been AAAS members for at least four years.
“Researchers are elected Fellows of the AAAS by their peers in recognition of significant contributions to their field,” said Karen Burg, vice president for research. “As we expand our research and innovation ecosystem, it’s exciting to see our faculty continue to be honored for their superb scholarship. I congratulate all of them on this wonderful achievement.”
The 2021 class of AAAS Fellows includes 564 scientists, engineers and innovators spanning 24 scientific disciplines who are being recognized for their scientifically and socially distinguished achievements. The new Fellows will be honored at the annual AAAS meeting in Philadelphia, Feb. 17-20. Along with the rest of their 2021 class, UGA’s three new Fellows will receive an official certificate and a gold and blue rosette pin whose colors represent science and engineering.
Including these three, 37 faculty at UGA are Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
UGA’s 2021 AAAS Fellows are:
James E. Byers: Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor and associate dean for research and operations in the Odum School of Ecology, Byers was selected for distinguished contributions to the field of ecology, particularly in invasion biology, parasite ecology, ecosystem engineering and range boundaries in marine environments, as well as excellence in teaching.
Jessica Kissinger: Distinguished Research Professor of genetics in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Kissinger was selected for distinguished contributions to the field of the evolution of infectious diseases, particularly for bioinformatics approaches.
Patricia Yager: Professor of marine science in the Franklin College, Yager was selected for outstanding work on climate-driven processes and their impact on marine ecosystems.
To view a list of all AAAS Fellows from UGA, visit the Office of Research website.
Bioinformatics Professor Ying Xu has been elected as a 2022 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Fellow for contributions to knowledge discovery from biological data.
Xu Tan of Dr. Andrew Paterson’s lab has successfully defended his dissertation, “Comprehensive analysis of resistance gene evolution, structural variation and recent genome rearrangement in plant genomes” on Wednesday, December 15, 2021. Congratulations Dr. Tan!
Research Corporation for Science Advancement and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have awarded a total of $1.25 million to 10 multidisciplinary teams of early career scientists — including Liliana Salvador, Infectious Diseases & Institute of Bioinformatics, University of Georgia — in the first year of the Scialog: Mitigating Zoonotic Threats initiative. Each of the 25 individual awards is $50,000.
Awards will go to 20 early career researchers from a variety of institutions, including two U.S. Department of Agriculture agencies working together at the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility — the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service and the Agricultural Research Service. The funded projects, to launch new research in the detection and mitigation of emerging animal-borne infectious diseases, include seven new partnerships between USDA and academic scientists.
Shunhua Han of Dr. Casey Bergman’s lab has successfully defended his dissertation, “Novel computational strategies for the analysis of transposable elements in Drosophila cell culture genomes.” on Friday, November 19, 2021. Congratulations Dr. Han!
Sara Shen of Dr. Art Edison’s lab has successfully defended her dissertation, “Characterization of Mesenchymal Stem Cells Using Metabolomics” on Tuesday, November 16, 2021. Congratulations Dr. Shen!
Yinwen Zhang of Dr. Bob Schmitz’ lab has successfully defended her dissertation, “Origination, Distribution, and Implication of Spontaneous Epialleles” on Friday, November 12, 2021. Congratulations Dr. Zhang!
