Garner to Lead Virginia Bioinformatics Institute

BLACKSBURG, Va., Oct. 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Harold "Skip" Garner has
been named executive director of the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI)
at Virginia Tech. Garner joins VBI from the University of Texas Southwestern
Medical Center (UTSW), where he was professor of Biochemistry and Internal
Medicine and the Philip O'Bryan Montgomery Jr., M.D. Distinguished Chair in
Developmental Biology. Before coming to UTSW in 1994, Garner served as a
senior staff scientist and founder of the Bioscience Division at General
Atomics in San Diego.

"We are delighted to have someone of the caliber of Dr. Garner accept the
challenge of leading VBI into its next phase of development," said Virginia
Tech University Distinguished Professor Paul Knox, who chaired the search
committee for the executive director position. "Dr. Garner impressed everyone
with his enthusiasm and knowledge for VBI and has a clear vision of how to
build upon the success of this internationally competitive research
institute."

"I welcome Dr. Garner to VBI and Virginia Tech," said Virginia Tech President
Charles W. Steger. "He brings an impressive array of skills and experiences to
the university at an exciting point in the growth of our research programs. I
know he looks forward to the opportunities to build on VBI's scientific
achievements, to strengthen collaborations with our colleges, to foster
innovation throughout our campus, including in undergraduate research, and to
embrace the research and education possibilities offered by the new Virginia
Tech Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute." Steger added, "Dr.
Garner's expertise and fit with Virginia Tech's many innovative scientific
programs will be a key asset moving forward."

Researchers at VBI are engaged in a wide range of scientific projects that
span bioinformatics and systems biology to high-performance computing,
complexity science, and policy and decision informatics. Garner remarked, "VBI
has an excellent track record of exploring the interface of biology, medicine
and the physical sciences. The institute is in an ideal position to take
advantage of the many exciting opportunities that are materializing in fields
such as genetics, computational biology, and clinical research." He added:
"VBI will continue to build on its strengths as one of the leading
international institutes for informatics and infectious disease research."

Garner's current research focuses on three areas: applied computational
biology; advanced instrumentation development; and genetics, genomics, and
proteomics research that builds upon software findings and instrumentation
capabilities. This includes research projects that focus on text mining
(deriving high-quality information from text) and DNA microsatellite analysis
(the study of short, repetitive DNA sequences that may have clinical
applications).

Garner added: "Opportunities in the life sciences are opening up across the
Virginia Tech campus, including possibilities to partner with translational
science initiatives at the recently created Virginia Tech Carilion School of
Medicine and Research Institute. VBI will work closely with Virginia Tech and
key partners as part of its mission to drive science, facilitate policy and
decision-making, and produce meaningful outcomes for society. We will also be
moving ahead with our business development efforts to make VBI's research
achievements more available via commercialization."

Garner received his Ph.D. in Plasma Physics from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison in 1982. He has published widely in leading peer-reviewed
journals throughout his career in plasma physics and bioengineering. He sits
on several corporate advisory boards and advises government and private
agencies. Garner is the founder of several biotechnology companies, including
Heliotext, Xanapath, BioAutomation, and Light Biology, which was acquired by
Nimblegen (now Roche Nimblegen Inc.), in 2004.

About the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute
The Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) at Virginia Tech has a research
platform centered on understanding the "disease triangle" of
host-pathogen-environment interactions in plants, humans and other animals. By
successfully channeling innovation into transdisciplinary approaches that
combine information technology and biology, researchers at VBI are addressing
some of today's key challenges in the biomedical, environmental and plant
sciences. https://www.vbi.vt.edu/

About Virginia Tech
Founded in 1872 as a land-grant college, Virginia Tech (http://www.vt.edu/) is
the most comprehensive university in the Commonwealth of Virginia and is among
the top research universities in the nation. Today, Virginia Tech's nine
colleges are dedicated to quality, innovation, and results through teaching,
research, and outreach activities. At its 2,600-acre main campus located in
Blacksburg and other campus centers in Northern Virginia, Southwest Virginia,
Hampton Roads, Richmond, Southside, and Roanoke, Virginia Tech enrolls more
than 28,000 undergraduate and graduate students from all 50 states and more
than 100 countries in 180 academic degree programs.

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SOURCE Virginia Tech

Barry Whyte of Virginia Tech, +1-540-231-1767, whyte@vbi.vt.edu