Search
About James Smith
James Smith, PhD is an adjunct faculty at the J. Craig Venter Institute. He focuses on biological risks from new and future technologies, and his previous experience spans industry, academic and policy roles. He has recently held positions at think tanks focused on biosecurity, as a senior fellow at the Center for Long Term Resilience and a Research Fellow at RAND.
JCVI La Jolla Breaks Ground
It is official! On Tuesday, September 20th JCVI officially broke ground on a new La Jolla, California sustainable lab, to be located directly on the campus of the University of California, San Diego. Craig Venter, JCVI Founder and President along with UCSD Chancellor Marye Anne Fox; Vice Chancellor for Health Sciences and Dean of the School of Medicine, David Brenner; Director of Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Vice Chancellor for Marine Sciences, Tony Haymet; and San Diego Mayor...
Genomic Center for Infectious Diseases (GCID)
The J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) Genomic Center for Infectious Diseases (GCID) was established by the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to investigate infectious disease biology through the application of DNA sequencing, genotyping, and comparative genome analysis. The JCVI GCID aims to study pathogens and the genetic determinants of their virulence, drug-resistance, immune evasion and interactions with the host, and host microbiome to advance...
Generating a Library of Influenza a Virus Hemagglutanin and Neuraminidase Genes
Titas Bera, Anthony Bennici, Haley Hochstein, Karla M. Stucker, Suman R. Das, David E. Wentworth Virology Group, J. Craig Venter Institute, Rockville, MD 20850 Every year, five to twenty percent of the United States population is infected with seasonal influenza, making the construction of a seasonal vaccine of high importance. However, due to antigenic drift among seasonal influenza viruses, the vaccine strains need frequent updating. Antigenic drift occurs as the genes...
Potential Breakthroughs in Treating Oral Disease Through Better Understanding of the Oral Microbiome
Most people think of bacteria as the enemy, but scientists at the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) are exploring ways to harness bacteria and phages (the viruses that infect bacteria) as a new way to fight infection. JCVI scientist, Anna Edlund, PhD, is leading one of our efforts to understand the human oral microbiome and learn what role bacteria play in both oral health and disease. Inflammatory gum disease (gingivitis/periodontal disease) and tooth decay are not only the two...
Evolution of allostery in the cyclic nucleotide binding module.
The cyclic nucleotide binding (CNB) domain regulates signaling pathways in both eukaryotes and prokaryotes. In this study, we analyze the evolutionary information embedded in genomic sequences to explore the diversity of signaling through the CNB domain and also how the CNB domain elicits a cellular response upon binding to cAMP.
The complete genome sequence of Chlorobium tepidum TLS, a photosynthetic, anaerobic, green-sulfur bacterium.
The complete genome of the green-sulfur eubacterium Chlorobium tepidum TLS was determined to be a single circular chromosome of 2,154,946 bp. This represents the first genome sequence from the phylum Chlorobia, whose members perform anoxygenic photosynthesis by the reductive tricarboxylic acid cycle. Genome comparisons have identified genes in C. tepidum that are highly conserved among photosynthetic species. Many of these have no assigned function and may play novel roles in photosynthesis...
About Harinder Singh
Harinder Singh, PhD is a Staff Scientist in the Infectious Disease Department at the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI). Dr. Singh's area of research is mostly focused on various data analysis, data mining, development of prediction algorithm and databases and bioinformatics pipelines for the scientific community. Dr. Singh has significant experience in analyzing proteomics, metabolomics, expression, microbiome and metagenomics datasets using various bioinformatics pipelines. Dr.