ASHG 2023 Scientific Program
Get ready for an exciting 5-day program at the ASHG 2023 Annual Meeting comprising of the year’s most significant new advances in the field. From Invited Sessions, to Workshops, to the Presidential Symposium – there is something for everyone! Browse the planned scientific sessions below and plan to check back on the website for more updates.
Invited Sessions: are developed and proposed around a particular topic. Panel/debate style sessions are encouraged. Submitting an invited proposal offers ASHG members the opportunity to directly participate in the development of the scientific program. Through a rigorous review process, the ASHG Program Committee assembles the best program possible on a diverse set of topics in human genetics.
Questions? Contact: programs@ashg.org
Friday, November 3
8:30 am – 10:00 am
Session Title: The ENCODE consortium: 2003 – 2023 (Panel)
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Use of race, ethnicity, and ancestry as population descriptors in genetics and genomics research (Panel)
Topic: Genetic Counseling, ELSI, Education, and Health Services Research
Track: Basic or Translational Research; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Can we promise precision medicine to all? (Panel)
Topic: Genetic Counseling, ELSI, Education, and Health Services Research
Track: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Does size matter? Changing the rules of human genetics with miniproteins
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Understanding human genetic variation through the lens of germ cell biology (Panel)
Topic: Evolutionary and Population Genetics
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: The nature of nurture: The importance of modeling indirect genetic effects in large-scale genetic studies
Topic: Statistical Genetics and Genetic Epidemiology
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Finding NEMO: Novel Enhanced Model Organism/Organs-on-chips platforms for translational genomics research (Panel)
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Genetic diagnosis of severe fetal and newborn conditions: Opportunities and challenges (Panel)
Topic: Prenatal, Perinatal, and Developmental Genetics
Track: Clinical Research
Audience: Clinicians
Session Title: RNA and nuclear structure: Perspective from the 4D nucleome program (Panel)
Topic: Epigenetics
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Saturday, November 4
8:30 am – 10:00 am
Session Title: Wrestling with social and behavioral genomics: Risks, potential benefits, and ethical responsibility (Panel)
Topic: Genetic Counseling, ELSI, Education, and Health Services Research
Track: Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Equitable access to genomics research: Australian Aboriginal leadership, expertise, and experience (Panel)
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Harnessing return of value: Progress in returning genomic results to individuals in diverse, large-scale programs (Panel)
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Basic or Translational Research; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Deploying hundreds of mammalian genomes to understand human disease (Panel)
Topic: Evolutionary and Population Genetics
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Male infertility – Mendelian traits with lifetime implications (Panel)
Topic: Mendelian Phenotypes
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: AI and machine learning in Alzheimer’s disease genetics and genomics (Panel)
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Track: Basic or Translational Research
Audience: Researchers
Session Title: Multiplexed assays of variant effect (MAVE): Generating, evaluating, and exploiting for improved clinical genetic diagnosis (Panel)
Topic: Molecular Effects of Genetic Variation
Track: Basic or Translational Research; Clinical Research
Audience: Clinicians
Invited Workshops: are interactive education events related to hands-on instruction that provide participants with experience and fluency in research tools, technologies, and skill development.
Questions? Contact: digitalprograms@ashg.org
Wednesday, November 1
11:00 am – 1:00 pm
Workshop Title: Teaching Variant Curation through Team-based, Active Learning Approaches
Topic: Genetic Counseling, ELSI, Education, and Health Services Research
Target Audience: Educators who teach undergraduate, masters and PhD students in genetics, genomics and bioinformatics, clinicians who supervise genetic counseling students, those interested in standardizing and improving the variant interpretation processes
Workshop Title: Genomic Analysis in the All of Us Researcher Workbench
Topic: Genetic, Genomic, and Epigenomic Resources and Databases
Target Audience: This workshop will be most beneficial to data scientists, bioinformaticians, health services researchers, epidemiologists, and genomics researchers at the introductory or intermediate level. It is recommended that attendees have basic familiarity with using R and/or Python programming languages and a working knowledge of basic genetic association study concepts and prior experience running a genetic association analysis.
2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Workshop Title: Using UK Biobank to Scale up your Research
Topic: Complex Traits
Target Audience: Scientists working on any topic in genetic epidemiology that might be augmented by
biobank data, who are: considering how such data might be used in their study, and/or are in the process of applying for data access, and would like to improve their application, and/or have done some biobank analysis and would like guidance on best practices.
Workshop Title: The Michigan Imputation Server: Data Preparation, Genotype Imputation, and Data Analysis
Topic: Statistical Genetics and Genetic Epidemiology
Target Audience: Attendees interested in learning how to perform genotype imputation and use imputed genotypes in their research, especially trainees. There are no prerequisites for this workshop. Attendees are expected to follow materials on their personal laptops.
Friday, November 3 from 5:30-7:00PM at the Washington Convention Center.
ASHG Symposium Description: Genetics and genomics research over the past quarter century has been transformed by technologies such as next generation sequencing and gene editing. These discoveries have and are being translated in the diagnostic and therapeutic arenas. No better examples are in the domains of cell free DNA sequencing in reproductive health and cancer, and gene therapies for Mendelian disorders of blood and the immune system. However, health access disparity to genomic medicine advances due to challenges in diversity of research participants, in economic and social determinants of health, and lack of genomic medicine expertise continue to the limit broad impact of genomic medicine on society and health. Recognizing and developing strategies and technologies to overcome disparity will prevent genomic medicine translation from becoming a Sisyphean task.
Moderators:
- TBD
Speakers and Format: Order TBD
-
Donald Kohn, MD Donald Kohn, MD, University of California Los Angeles David Geffen School of Medicine
- TITLE: Gene Therapy for Blood Cell Diseases using Hematopoietic Stem Cells
- Cover the field’s advances in cell and gene therapy with emphasis on immunological and hematological disorders like SCID and sickle cell anemia
-
Dennis Lo, MD, PhD Dennis Lo, MD, PhD, Chinese University of Hong Kong
- Cover the field’s advances in cell free DNA diagnostics in the realm of reproductive health, cancer, and infectious diseases.
- 3rd Speaker TBD
The goal of the symposium is to highlight the enormous research advances of genetics and genomics research in the past two decades, examples of successful clinical implementation, and the continuing challenges of health access disparity. We want to ultimately convey the power and successes of genomic medicine, but also to remind ourselves of the importance of the continued need to increase access to current and future genomic medicine discoveries.
This special symposium organized by the Program Committee (PC) is scheduled on Sunday, November 5 from 11:30 am – 1:00 pm to celebrate ASHG’s 75th Anniversary.
The Future of Human Genetics and Genomics. The past 75 years has seen an explosion in the advancement of human genetics and genomics, with the identification of disease genes and mapping the human genome through the Human Genome Project and the accomplishment of a truly complete human genome assembly in 2022. Genome engineering has moved from recombinant DNA techniques to genome editing via CRISPR-Cas9, with implications for treatment and correction of genetic diseases. What are the next steps for the fields of genetics and genomics? The 2023 Program Committee Symposium will feature established and emerging leaders who have blazed new conceptual and technological trails in the field and will share their opinions on the important areas of opportunity for the future of human genetics.
Moderators:
- Hunt F. Willard, PhD, Genome Medical, Inc.
- Ambroise Wonkam, MD, PhD, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Speakers (15 minutes each):
- Karen Miga, PhD, University of California, Santa Cruz, Title: TBD
- Topic: The biological and clinical implications of the new T2T genome assemblies and the outlook for the future of genetics in the era of T2T genomics.
- Cynthia Morton, PhD, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Title: TBD
- Topic: The future of cytogenetics research, its implementation, and how new developments will transform our field.
- Melissa B. Davis, PhD, Cornell University, Title: TBD
- Topic: Research ethics involving inclusion of diverse populations in genetics, genomics, and biobanking research and the equitable implementation of personalized medicine.
- Adam Rutherford, PhD, University College London, Title: TBD
- Topic: Genetics through time
Discussion/Q&A with audience participation at the end of the symposium