Center for Precision Medicine and Genomics Research

Main Center Contacts

Ljubica Caldovic, PhD

Interim Director, Center for Genetic Medicine Research
[email protected] 202-545-2804
Jyoti Jaiswal, PhD

Director of Academic Development, Center for Genetic Medicine Research
[email protected] 202-545-2799
Toni Freeland

Senior Research Center Manager
[email protected] 202-545-2782

About the Center

The Center for Precision Medicine and Genomics Research houses a highly interdisciplinary faculty, with nearly half of the physician-scientists coming from clinical divisions in the hospital. We focus on common health problems in Washington, D.C., as well as serving as an international referral site for rare disorders. Faculty and their laboratories are encouraged to be collaborative and many of the Center’s projects bring together multiple clinical and scientific disciplines. The Center strives to provide faculty easy access to the latest technologies in genomics, microscopy, bioinformatics, pre-clinical (murine) drug trials, and multi-site clinical trial networks. The Center provides services in these technologies to laboratories throughout the District, and internationally, through a series of National Institutes of Health (NIH) Core grants. Drug development and experimental therapeutics are also a major focus.

We use data from interdisciplinary studies of molecules and pathways to create interactive physiological models of human health and disease that provide novel insights about potential strategies for disease prevention and treatment.

Interferon Regulatory Factor 6

Youssef A. Kousa, MS, DO, PhD, a clinical fellow in the Division of Child Neurology at Children's National, explains how mutations in interferon regulatory factor 6 ( IRF6) that cause cleft lip and palate also are implicated in neural tube defects such as spina bifida.