Kenro Kusumi
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| Title | Dean of Natural Sciences and professor at Arizona State University |
| Spouse | Stephen Pratt |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Harvard College (AB), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (PhD) |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Genome biologist |
Kenro Kusumi, a genome biologist and professor, Dean of Natural Sciences in The College of Liberal Arts and SciencesatArizona State University.[1]
Kusumi was raised in Raleigh and attended high school at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in Durham, where he was a 1984 national winner of the NASA Space Shuttle Student Involvement Project.[2][3] Kusumi received his AB in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard College in 1988 and PhD[4] in Biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1997 with doctoral advisor Eric S. Lander.[5] He was a Hitchings-Elion Fellow of the Burroughs Wellcome Fund in the laboratory of developmental biologist Robb Krumlauf at the National Institute for Medical Research in London.[6]
Kusumi was assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania and The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia from 2001 to 2006,[5] where he served as Director of Pediatric Orthopaedic Basic Science Research.[7] He and his collaborators had used genomic approaches to identify the first genetic cause of the congenital spinal disorder, spondylocostal dysostosis, caused by mutations in delta-like 3 (DLL3),[8] and he contributed to subsequent research identifying mutations in the LFNG and HES7 genes for related congenital axial skeletal disorders.[9][10]
Kusumi is Dean of Natural Sciences in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University.[11] Prior, he held the position of Associate Dean in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University.[12] From 2019 to 2021, he was Director of ASU's School of Life Sciences, the university's first interdisciplinary school established in 2003.[13]
Kusumi is a member of the LGBTQIA+ community.[14] He serves as mentor in ASU's HUES program[15] and GRADient organization for gender and sexual minority graduate students and their allies.[16]
Kusumi's research at ASU uses genome biology to help conserve and study the functional adaptations of reptiles.[17] Kusumi has sequenced the genome of the threatened Mojave desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) as a tool for conservation efforts.[18][19] Kusumi has led the first genome-scale analysis of accelerated evolution associated with the anole lizard's functional adaptations.[20] His group has also uncovered sets of genes that are critical in the ability of anole lizards to adapt and regenerate parts of their bodies.[21]
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Kusumi is married to Stephen Pratt, professor at Arizona State University.[22]
