Posted By: Alyson Barnes, PhD, Assistant Editor, AJHG
Each month, the editors of The American Journal of Human Genetics interview an author of a recently published paper. This month we check in with Jessica to discuss their recent paper “Characterizing features affecting local ancestry inference performance in admixed populations.”
AB: What motivated you to start working on this project?
JH: One of my interests in genetics research is to help reduce disparities between populations, so that we can achieve more inclusive and effective risk prediction/healthcare. Although more focused on the methodological aspects, in this project we investigated how accurately local ancestry inference (LAI) is performing, which is relevant for other methods that depend on this prediction to correct statistical models for admixed populations.
AB: What about the papers/project most excites you?
JH: I feel that this work helps to establish analysis practices and can be useful for other research groups working with admixed populations.
AB: Thinking about the bigger picture, what implications do you see from this work for the larger human genetics community?
JH: I hope this work motivates the genetics community to pursue improving the representation of human populations in publicly available datasets. We expect that with more representative datasets, the better the LAI algorithm will perform.
AB: What advice do you have for trainees/young scientists?
JH: As a young scientist myself, I believe we must try our best to find what aspects we like during our trainee experiences, and shape our research focuses on the things we enjoy and/or are motivated by. Also, never stop trying to improve your abilities and try to advocate for the community!
AB: And for fun, tell us something about your life outside of the lab.
JH: I love drawing and am currently learning how to develop video games with my friends. It’s a lot of work but also a load of fun!
Jessica Honorato-Mauer, MS is a Bioinformatics Analyst in the Molecular and Human Genetics department at Baylor College of Medicine.