Keyan Zhao

The recipient of a doctorate in computational biology and bioinformatics from the University of Southern California, Keyan Zhao, PhD, has spent the past decade as a statistical geneticist and computational biologist. Skilled in computer languages including C++, Unix shell, and SQL, Dr. Zhao also has experience in next-generation sequencing data analysis, such as those for complex diseases. Organisms he has studied include Arabidopsis, rice, dog, cow and humans. Currently, Keyan Zhao, is working at a biotech company after his postdoc training at University of California's Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics.

Over the past decade, Dr. Zhao has been published in numerous journals. Genetics printed his pieces on trans-specific polymorphism and association mapping with single-feature polymorphisms. Some of the other topics he has covered include discovering genes important for the rice yield and quality, understanding the genetic architecture of Oryza sativa (Asian rice), and discovering the potential of canine hip dysplasia through genetic studies. In 2013, Keyan Zhao, PhD, developed a more robust statistical method for genetic studies of alternative splicing and published “GLiMMPS: Robust statistical model for regulatory variation of alternative splicing using RNA-seq data” on Genome Biology.