Faculty Mentor

Professor Christopher Ellison received his BA in Biology from Lewis & Clark College and his Ph.D. in Microbiology from UC Berkeley. His lab studies transposons, which are selfish genetic elements, also known as "jumping genes", that have colonized the genomes of almost all life on earth. Transposons can cause disease and also facilitate adaptation. The Ellison lab uses a variety of computational approaches to study how these mobile elements coevolve with their host genomes. He has two daughters and two cats, and when he is not hanging out with them he enjoys birding, running, and cycling.