Stephen Warren (geneticist) explained

Stephen Warren
Birth Date:1953
Birth Place:East Detroit, Michigan
Death Date:6 June 2021
Nationality:American
William Patterson Timmie Professor of Human Genetics
Charles Howard Candler Chair of Human Genetics
Alma Mater:Michigan State University
Workplaces:Emory University

Stephen T. Warren was an American geneticist and academic. He was the William Patterson Timmie Professor of Human Genetics and the Charles Howard Candler Chair of Human Genetics. He was the former Founding Chairman of the Department of Human Genetics at Emory University School of Medicine.Web site: Stephen T Warren, Ph.D., FACMG. He was an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute from 1991 until 2002, when he resigned to found the Human Genetics department. Warren is well known for his work in the field of Human Genetics. His research was focused on the mechanistic understanding of fragile X syndrome, a leading cause of inherited developmental disability and autism.[1] In 2020, Warren stepped down as department chair after 20 years in that position.

In 2003, Warren was an inaugural inductee of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development’s Hall of Honor for the "identification of triplet repeat expansion as the cause of fragile X syndrome and as an entirely new inherited mechanism of genetic disease".[2] He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2004, the National Academy of Sciences in 2011[3] and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2015.[4] He is a diplomat of the American Board of Medical Genetics.

Warren is the former Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Human Genetics and Former President of the American Society of Human Genetics.[5]

Education

Warren was born in 1953 and was raised in East Detroit, Michigan (now Eastpointe, Michigan). He began his undergraduate studies at Michigan State University in 1972 and graduated with a B.S. in Zoology in 1976. While a freshman, he began his involvement in medical genetics by volunteering in the clinical genetics diagnostic laboratory with James Higgins where he continued to work throughout his undergraduate studies. During his summer breaks he worked with geneticists Lester Weiss and Gene Jackson at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.[5]

Warren continued his graduate studies at Michigan State University, completing his Ph.D. in Human Genetics in 1981. His doctoral Advisor was James Trosko. He completed his post graduate training at the University of Illinois at Chicago at the Center for Genetics and at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory Heidelberg.[5]

Career

Following his postgraduate fellowship, he joined Emory University as an Assistant Professor in the departments of Biochemistry and Pediatrics (Medical Genetics) in 1985. He was promoted to Associate Professor in 1991 and Full Professor in 1993.

Throughout his career, Warren has been involved with the American Society of Human Genetics in various capacities, becoming the President of the Society in 2006. In 1999, he won the William Allan Award, the highest honor of the American Society of Human Genetics.[5]

Research and work

His doctoral dissertation was entitled "Bloom syndrome as a human mutator mutation". He published 12 manuscripts during his doctoral training. Warren's postdoctoral studies were focused on human molecular genetics and he first began his studies on fragile X syndrome. He made somatic cell hybrids isolating the human fragile X chromosome in rodent cells and devised a strategy to molecular clone the DNA responsible for the syndrome.[5]

He began his molecular experiments to implement this strategy in 1985 when he established his own laboratory at Emory University. Using his somatic cells hybrids, Warren led an international group, including his longtime collaborator David L. Nelson at Baylor College of Medicine, that isolated the FMR1 gene responsible for fragile X syndrome in 1991. The cloning of this locus also uncovered, for the first time, a trinucleotide repeat expansion mutation, a mechanism now known to be responsible for dozens of genetic diseases.[5]

Warren and collaborators subsequently demonstrated that the expanded FMR1 repeat in patients leads to transcriptional suppression and the absence of the encoded protein, FMRP. He has shown that this protein is a selective RNA-binding protein and identified FMRP associated mRNAs. Subsequent research in his laboratory demonstrated that FMRP is involved in the regulation of local protein synthesis at the synapse and that in the absence of FMRP, the FMRP-associated mRNAs are over translated, in an activity-dependent manner.[5]

Awards and honors

Publications

Selected papers

Books

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Compensating for a faulty gene.
  2. Web site: NICHD Honors Outstanding Scientists During 40th Anniversary Year.
  3. Web site: Stephen T. Warren.
  4. Web site: Dr. Stephen T. Warren Named to American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
  5. Web site: Profile of Stephen T. Warren.
  6. Web site: Steps - A Jacob's Ladder Publication.
  7. Web site: Fragile X Researcher Honored By March of Dimes.
  8. Web site: Dean's Distinguished Faculty Lecture and Award.
  9. Web site: Award for Excellence in Molecular Diagnostics Past Recipients.
  10. Web site: Dr. Stephen T. Warren Named to American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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