Hello! I am a bioethicist focusing on the Ethical, Legal and Social Implications of Genetics and Genomics (ELSI). I am interested in the past, present and future impact of genomics on individuals and on society. I used to work in the genetics industry; I am convinced of the need for careful reflection and gathering of evidence to help ensure the upsides of genomics are realized, hence my career redirection towards ELSI work. You can read more on my publications page.

I am currently a Research Associate at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard, where I am directing a project on the concepts of ancestry and population. Motivated by the increasing importance of these concepts across biomedicine, we are doing empirical and normative work around how these concepts are and should be used. I also do a lot of work related to predictive genomics, and in particular the clinical use of polygenic risk scores. Other recent projects include the first international policy for the return of results to research participants, and protections against genetic discrimination in life insurance.

Previously, I worked as a computational biologist and product manager. I was with Fabric Genomics (formerly Omicia), a company bridging the gap between sequencing data and actionable clinical reports. And also at the erstwhile Driver Inc, “The cure for cancer treatment”, who sequenced tumor DNA as one part of an effort to match cancer patients to clinical trials. My doctoral degree is in Systems Biology from the University of Oxford.

Prior to the pandemic, I was blogging round-ups of genomics developments at All The Coolest Genomics.

Twitter: @acflewis