Dr. Lynn Petukhova is an assistant professor in the Department of Dermatology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC).  Dr. Petukhova received her academic training at CUMC in the Departments of Biostatistics and Epidemiology.As a genetic epidemiologist, she studies diseases that span the spectrum of etiological heterogeneity, deciphering single gene causes of rare disorders and resolving allelic contributions to diseases that are common in the population.  Her research is primarily focused on gene discovery and the generation of medically relevant insight by translating genetic evidence to disease mechanisms.

Molecularly defined disease mechanisms provide the crucial link between patient and therapy in the emerging paradigm for precision medicine.  Identifying disease subtypes among groups of patients who present with the same diagnosis, but whose disease arises from different physiological perturbations, allows physicians to develop effective and efficient treatment strategies.  Identifying mechanistic links between diseases provides rationale for drug repurposing, which can have an immediate and substantial impact on unmet needs, as Dr. Petukhova has demonstrated with genetic studies in alopecia areata.

Dr. Petukhova works with genetic data from genome-wide genotyping assays, from targeted resequencing across linkage disequilibrium blocks identified in genome wide association studies (GWAS), from exome sequencing in family cohorts and cohorts of unrelated people, and from public resources such as Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) and the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE).  She also works with clinical data from electronic health records (EHR) and patient registries.