Cynthia Morton, PhD
"Personalized medicine means optimizing my health during my lifetime based on “the recipe” for me from my genome combined with knowledge of how that recipe interfaces with my environment (e.g., medications, foods, exercise, work and social settings). Education in genetics and genomics is fundamental for healthcare professionals and the public to reap the benefits of personalized medicine." - Cynthia Morton
Cynthia Morton, Ph.D. is the William Lambert Richardson Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Biology and Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School. She is an Associate Director of Education for Partners Personalized Medicine and is the Principal Investigator for the HMS Training Grant that supports the HMS Genetics Training Program that is administered by Partners Personalized Medicine.
Cynthia Morton received her Bachelor’s of Science degree from the College of William and Mary in Virginia and her Ph.D. in Human Genetics from the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond. She is the William Lambert Richardson Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Biology and Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School, Director of Cytogenetics and Past Director of the Biomedical Research Institute at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She is certified by the American Board of Medical Genetics in Ph.D. Medical Genetics, Clinical Cytogenetics and Clinical Molecular Genetics. Her research interests are in molecular cytogenetics, hereditary deafness, genetics of uterine leiomyomata and human developmental disorders. She has published over 260 original articles.
As Director of Cytogenetics, she has implemented the use of next-generation sequencing to provide nucleotide resolution of balanced chromosomal rearrangements detected in the prenatal setting. Her laboratory has been a major site for training laboratory geneticists in clinical cytogenetics.
She is a past member of the Board of Directors of the American Board of Medical Genetics where she served as Secretary, Treasurer and Chair of the Accreditation Committee. She was the Chair of the Molecular Genetic Pathology Policy and Exam Committees of the American Board of Medical Genetics and the American Board of Pathology. She served as Member and Chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Institute of Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, and as Member and Chair of the Board of Regents of the National Library of Medicine. She was a member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Human Genetics and most recently completed a six year tenure as Editor of The American Journal of Human Genetics. She is currently a member of the Counsel of Scientific Trustees of the Hearing Health Foundation, and Chair of the Veteran's Administration Genomic Medicine Program Advisory Committee. She is currently President of the American Society of Human Genetics.
- 1977, BS, Biology, The College of William and Mary in Virginia
- 1982, PhD, Human Genetics, Medical College of Virginia
- Talkowski ME, Rosenfeld JA, Blumenthal I, Pillalamarri V, Chiang C, Heilbut A, Ernst C, Hanscom C, Rossin E, Lindgren AM, Pereira S, Ruderfer D, Kirby A, Ripke S, Harris DJ, Lee J-H, Ha K, Kim H-G, Solomon BD, Gropman AL, Lucente D, Sims K, Ohsumi TK, Borowsky ML, Loranger S, Quade BJ, Lage K, Miles J, Wu B-L, Shen Y, Neale B, Shaffer LG, Daly MJ, Morton CC, Gusella JF: Sequencing balanced chromosomal rearrangements discovers autism genes associated with phenotypic outcomes that cross traditional diagnostic boundaries. Cell 2012; 149:525-537.
- Kim H-G, Kim H-T, Leach NT, Lan F, Ullmann R, Silahtaroglu A, Kurth I, Nowka A, Sik Seong I, Shen Y, Talkowski ME, Ruderfer D, Lee J-H, Glotzbach C, Ha K, Kjaergaard S, Levin AV, Romeike BF, Kleefstra T, Bartsch O, Elsea SH, Jabs EW, MacDonald ME, Harris DJ, Quade BJ, Ropers H-H, Shaffer LG, Kutsche K, Layman LC, Tommerup N, Kalscheuer VM, Shi Y, Morton CC, Kim C-H, Gusella JF: Translocations disrupting PHF21A in the Potocki-Shaffer syndrome region are associated with intellectual disability and craniofacial anomalies. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2012; 91:56-72.
- Cho H-J, Park H-J, Trexler M, Venselaar H, Lee KY, Robertson NG, Baek J-I, Kang BS, Morton CC, Vriend G, Patthy L, Kim U-K: A novel COCH mutation associated with autosomal dominant nonsyndromic hearing loss disrupts the structural stability of the vWFA2 domain. J. Mol. Med. 2012; 90:1321-1331.
- Eggert SL, Huyck KL, Somasundaram P, Kavalla R, Stewart EA, Lu AT, Painter JN, Montgomery GW, Medland SE, Nyholt DR, Treloar SA, Zondervan KT, Heath AC, Madden PAF, Rose L, Buring JE, Ridker PM, Chasman DI, Martin NG, Cantor RM, Morton CC: Genome-wide linkage and association analyses implicate FASN in predisposition to uterine leiomyomata. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2012; 91:621-628.
- Talkowski ME*, Ordulu Z*, Pillalamarri V, Benson CB, Blumenthal I, Connolly S, Hanscom C, Hussain N, Pereira S, Picker J, Rosenfeld JA, Shaffer LG, Wilkins-Haug LE, Gusella JF, Morton CC: Whole genome sequencing in a prenatal case with multiple anomalies and a balanced translocation. N. Engl. J. Med. 2012; 367:2226-2232. (*co-first authors)
- Talkowski ME, Maussion G, Crapper L, Rosenfeld JA, Blumenthal I, Hanscom C, Chiang C, Lindgren A, Pereira S, Ruderfer D, Diallo A, Lopez JP, Turecki G, Chen ES, Gigek C, Harris DJ, Lip V, An Y, Biagoli M, MacDonald ME, Lin M, Haggarty SJ, Sklar P, Purcell S, Kellis M, Schwartz S, Shaffer LG, Natowicz MR, Shen Y, Morton CC, Gusella JF, Ernst C: Disruption of a large intergenic non-coding RNA in subjects with neurodevelopmental disabilities. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2012; 91:1128-1134.
- Beunders G, Voorhoeve E, Golzio C, Parbo L, Rosenfeld JA, Talkowski ME, Simonic I, Lionel AC, Vergult S, Pyatt RE, van de Kamp J, Nieuwint A, Weiss MM, Rizzu P, Verwer LE, van Spaendonk R, Shen Y, Wu B, Yu T, Yu Y, Chiang C, Gusella JF, Lindgren AM, Morton CC, van Binsbergen E, Bulk S, van Rossem E, Vanakker O, Armstrong R, Park S, Greenhalgh L, Maye U, Neill NJ, Abbott KM, Sell S, Ladda R, Farber DM, Bader PI, Cushing T, Drautz JM, Konczal L, Nash P, de Los Reyes E, Carter MT, Hopkins E, Marshall CR, Osborne LR, Gripp KW, Thrush DL, Hashimoto S, Gastier-Foster JM, Astbury C, Ylstra B, Meijers-Heijboer H, Posthuma D, Menten B, Mortier G, Scherer SW, Eichler EE, Girirajan S, Katsanis N, Groffen AJ, Sistermans EA: Exonic deletions in AUTS2 cause a syndromic form of intellectual disability and suggest a critical role for the C-terminus. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2013; 92:210-220.
- Lindgren AM, Hoyos T, Talkowski ME, Hanscom C, Blumenthal I, Chiang C, Ernst C, Pereira S, Ordulu Z, Clericuzio C, Drautz JM, Rosenfeld JA, Shaffer LG, Velsher L, Pynn T, Vermeesch J, Harris DJ, Gusella JF, Liao EC, Morton CC: Haploinsufficiency of KDM6A is associated with severe psychomotor retardation, global growth restriction and cleft palate. Hum. Genet. 2013; 132:537-552.
- Hodge JC, Mitchell E, Pillalamarri V, Toler TL, Bartel F, Kearney HM, Zou YS, Tan W-H, Hanscom C, Kirmani S, Hanson RR, Skinner SA, Rogers C, Everman DB, Boyd E, Mullegama SV, Keelean-Fuller D, Powell CM, Elsea SH, Morton CC, Gusella JF, DuPont B, Chaubey A, Lin AE, Talkowski ME: Disruption of methyl CpG binding protein 5 contributes to a spectrum of psychopathology and neurodevelopmental abnormalities. Mol. Psych., in press.
- Genovese G, Handsaker RE, Li H, Altemose N, Lindgren AM, Chambert K, Pasaniuc B, Price AL, Reich D, Morton CC, Pollak MR, Wilson JG, McCarroll SA: Using population admixture to help complete maps of the human genome. Nature Genet. 2013, 45:406-414.
- Currall BB, Chiang CC, Talkowski ME, Morton CC: Mechanisms for structural variation in the human genome. Curr. Genet. Med. Rep. 2013, 1:81-90.
- 2001: VCU Life Sciences Advisory Board, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond
- 2001: Council of Scientific Trustees, Deafness Research Foundation
- 2002-13: External Advisory Committee, University of Nebraska Neurosensory CoBRE
- 2003: Mary Horrigan Conners Award, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
- 2004: MacArthur Research Service Award, Brigham and Women’s Hospital Research Council
- 2008-13: Advisory Board, The Raphael Recanati Genetic Institute, Rabin Medical Center, Petach Tikva, Israel
- 2010: Kappa Kappa Gamma National Alumna Achievement Award
- Cynthia Morton has been quoted in the article "Baby DNA Analysis Ushers in Brave New World of Treatment" by John Lauerman. Check it out here: