Director of Repository Science
Laura Scheinfeldt, PhD, is the principal investigator of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) Human Genetics Resource Center and the NHGRI Sample Repository for Human Genetic Research at the Coriell Institute for Medical Research.
The NINDS Human Genetics Resource Center at Coriell Institute receives blood samples and clinical data from individuals diagnosed with neurological disorders and stroke as well as unaffected relatives and population controls and distributes DNA and cell lines to promote neurological disease research.
The NHGRI Sample Repository for Human Genetic Research distributes cell lines and DNA from 27 HapMap and 1000 Genomes Project population samples. These biospecimens are high-quality resources for the study of genetic and genomic variation in human populations living around the world.
Laura previously served as a research scientist in Coriell Institute’s Coriell Personalized Medicine Collaborative (CPMC), a research study to evaluate the clinical utility of genetic data. In this role, Laura applied her background in population genetics to the participant-based initiative and supported the research and analysis goals of the study.
Prior to joining Coriell, Laura was the assistant director for the Institute for Genomics and Evolutionary Medicine at Temple University, studying the ways in which past human adaptation has impacted contemporary genomic variation and disease. Laura earned her undergraduate degree in biology from Skidmore College in New York. She received her doctorate in biological anthropology from Temple University, where she researched genetic variation and population migration in the Southwest Pacific. As a postdoctoral research scientist, Laura explored genotype-phenotype relationships related to congenital heart disease at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and conducted computational analyses of human population genomic data at the University of Washington's Department of Genome Sciences and at the University of Pennsylvania's Department of Genetics.
