Cross-ancestry Genomic Research: Time to Bridge the Gap

The success of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in humans have yielded a wealth of clues about the molecular basis of many common human diseases. In addition, polygenic risk scores (PRS) for a variety of traits are increasingly becoming accurate enough to be useful for clinical practice, realizing the longstanding goal of personalized medicine. However, data collection continues to be predominantly imbalanced towards individuals of European ancestry, and it is abundantly clear that methods developed in one human ancestry group do not perform well in other ancestry groups, limiting their utility and exacerbating already severe health disparities. The speakers in this session will introduce recent efforts to level ancestry imbalance in genomic research, including the formation of large collaborative efforts and the development of novel statistical methods.

Recorded session from the 2021 virtual meeting.