Norman Arnheim
Holder of the Ester Dornsife Chair in Biological Sciences in the USC College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.
Researcher Norman Arnheim is tracking the secrets of disease-causing genes. He has produced groundbreaking research on mutational changes in human genetic diseases such as spinal cerebellar ataxia, myotonic dystrophy and Huntington's disease. "We believe that the technique will greatly speed the identification of mutations, with direct applications for understanding genetically based human disease," Arnheim says.
Arnheim is also the co-leader of a group that developed the polymerase chain reaction — a technology critical to completion of the human genome project. In 1992, he won a 10-year MERIT award from the National Institutes of Health to study the fundamental process of genetic recombination in human chromosomes.
Arnheim, a molecular and computational biologist, is co-creator of a research tool that allows speedy reconstruction of the way genes are written on human chromosomes. He joined USC in 1985.