David Haussler

David Haussler is a Professor in the Department of Biomolecular Engineering at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz). He serves as Scientific Director of the UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute and is an affiliate of Crown College at UC Santa Cruz. His research integrates mathematics, computer science, and molecular biology to analyze the human genome and neural circuits, pioneering methods like hidden Markov models and discriminative kernel approaches for DNA/RNA/protein sequence analysis.

Haussler co-founded major global initiatives including the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health and the Genome 10K Project (now the Vertebrate Genome Sequencing Project). He also initiated the BRCA-exchange, Pangenome Project, and Treehouse Childhood Cancer Project. His lab employs CRISPR, organoids, and single-cell RNA-seq to study human-evolved neurodevelopmental genes linked to disease.

Key awards include the Dan David Prize (2015), Weldon Memorial Prize (2011), and Allen Newell Award (2003), alongside memberships in the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and fellowships from AAAS and AAAI.