James Cai

James is interested in the elucidation of genotype-phenotype relationships using computational genomics approaches. His lab seeks evolutionary interpretation of causal and associated variants underlying genetic disorders and complex traits of different organisms. During his time as Postdoctoral Fellow in the Petrov Lab (2006-2010) James discovered the first clear signatures of recurrent adaptation in the patterns of human genetic variation, worked on understanding of patterns of evolution of genes of different evolutionary age, and peculiar network and evolutionary properties of genes that can underlie human disease. James develops various statistical tests and computational tools to understand the processes shaping genome variability patterns within and between species and maintains three Matlab toolboxes for population genetics, molecular evolution, and systems biology.  His current research focuses on understanding the genetic basis of phenotypic variability in humans. Members of James’ lab all work at the interface of human genetics, computational statistics, and data science. They use a high-performance scientific computing language Matlab to develop computational tools, and use these tools to assess the impact of common and rare genetic variant and chromatin dynamics on gene expression variability in humans.