Janet Kelso
Group leader
Department of Evolutionary Genetics
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6
04103 Leipzig
Curriculum Vitae
Biographical
| Name: | Janet Kelso |
| Nationality: | German |
| Email: | kelso@[>>> Please remove the text! <<<]eva.mpg.de |
Professional Appointments
| Since 2023 | Joint Head of the Ancient DNA Core Unit at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany |
| Since 2004 | Research Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany |
| 2003-2004 | Postdoctoral researcher. University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa |
Education
| 2003 | Ph.D. (Bioinformatics). University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa Advisor: Winston Hide |
| 2000 | M.Sc. (Med) (Chemical Pathology). University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa |
| 1997 | B.Sc. (Med) (Hons) (Medical Biochemistry). University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa |
| 1995 | B.Sc. (Biology). University of-Natal, Durban, South Africa. |
Grants, fellowships and awards
| 2019 | Co-investigator: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) project: A High-coverage Ancient Genome for Analyzing Arctic Adaptation Mechanisms – the Steller’s Sea Cow Case. |
| 2017 | Chinese Academy of Sciences International Partnership Award for Young Scientists (with Qiaomei Fu) |
| 2016 | Elected Fellow of the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) |
| 2015 | Co-investigator: DKFZ: Grant for sequencing of degraded DNA from FFPE samples in melanoma |
| 2013 | Principle Investigator: Evolutionary Aspects of Metabolism- and Obesity-Associated Genes in Primates as part of the DFG Sonderforschungsbereich “Obesity Mechanisms” Consortium (SFB 1052) |
| 2011 | EU COST Next generation sequencing data analysis network and training consortium. |
| 2011 | Co-investigator DKFZ Grant for melanoma transcriptome analysis (together with Professor Manfred Kunz, University of Leipzig) |
| 2010 | AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize for the most outstanding paper in Science in 2010 |
| 2004 | L'Oréal-UNESCO/DST fellowship for Women in Science: Young Scientist Award |
| 2003 | Merck PhD Student Fellowship |
Scientific service
Editorial
| 2022-present | Scientific Committee: PaleoAnthropology |
| 2013-present | Executive Editor Bioinformatics (Oxford University Press) |
| 2011-2012 | Associate Editor Bioinformatics (Oxford University Press) |
| 2009-present | Associate Editor Database (Oxford University Press) |
| 2014-present | Editorial Board Genome Biology |
| 2007-2014 | Editor PLoS One |
| 2012-present | Editorial Board Springer book series: Computational Biology |
International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB)
| 2022-2025 | Treasurer, Executive Board member |
| 2006-2011 | Secretary, Executive Board member |
| 2011-2013, 2017-2019 | Vice-president, Executive Board member |
| 2005-present | Member of Board of Directors, Conference Committee Chair |
Conference Organisation
| 2025 | Scientific Organiser: Genetics Society UK “Ancient Genomes: Perspectives on Human Biology and Medicine” (with Pontus Skoglund) |
| 2023 | Session Chair: CSHL Genome Informatics (with Rayan Chikhi) |
| 2019 | Advances in Computational Biology / Bioinfo4Women. Conference co-chair (with Núria López-Bigas and Alison Kennedy) |
| 2015-2017 | CSHL Genome Informatics Organiser (with Daniel McArthur, Mike Schatz, Aaron Quinlan and Melissa Wilson-Sayres) |
| 2014 | CSHL Genome Informatics Session Chair (with Nick Loman) |
| 2011 | ISCB-Africa ASBCB Conference Co-Chair (with Nicola Mulder) |
| 2006-present | Organising committee of the Conference of the International Society for Computational Biology (ISMB). Conference Chair 2014 (with Bonnie Berger) & 2015 (with Alex Bateman and Des Higgins) |
| 2006-2013 | Chair of ISMB Tutorials Programme |
Advisory Boards/Review Panels (Selected)
| 2025 | Science Council | Institut Pasteur |
| 2025 | Advisory Council | National Institute for Theoretical and Computational Sciences |
| 2023-present | Advisory Board | Sydney Brenner Institute for Molecular Bioscience |
| 2022-present | Advisory Board | DS-I Research Hub: INFORM Africa |
| 2021-present | Advisory Board | German Human Genome-Phenome Archive |
| 2021-present | Advisory Board | Institute of Evolutionary Biology (CSIC-UPF), Barcelona |
| 2019 | Reviewer | Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology |
| 2018-2023 | Advisory Board | H3-Africa BioNet |
| 2016 | Review Panel | ERC Consolidator Grants |
| 2015-present | Advisory Board | Centre for Molecular Medicine (CeMM), Vienna |
| 2015 | Review panel | EBI-EMBL External Services |
| 2015-present | Review board | H3-Africa/NIH Sickle Cell Disease Ontology Development |
| 2013-present | Advisory Board | ELIXIR Scientific Advisory Board |
| 2013-present | Advisory Board | NIH-H3Africa Wits-INDEPTH Centre |
| 2012, 2015 | Advisory Board | Genome Canada Bioinformatics & Computational Biology |
| 2014-present | Review panel | Hercules Foundation/FWO for Belgian Research Infrastructure |
| 2009-2012 | Review panel | South African National Research Foundation |
| 2011 | Advisory Board | Genome Canada 4D Genomics Platform |
| 2010 | Review panel | Deutsche Forschungsgsgemeinschaft (DFG) Instrumentation |
| 2003-2011 | Advisory Board | Genome Canada Bioinformatics Platform |
External Mentorship
| 2025/2026 | Mentor: ELIXIR ELEAD Programme |
| 2022-2023 & 2023/2024 | Mentor: Leibniz Mentoring Programme |
| 2022/2023 | Mentor: B4W International Mentoring Programme for Young Scientists |
Invited presentations and workshops (since 2022)
| 2025 | Invited Presentation: CARTA Symposium - Ancient DNA: New Revelations, UC San Diego, USA. Invited Presentation: ASHG Presidential Symposium, Boston, USA. Keynote: Société d'Anthropologie de Paris: Asia as a Crossroads, Paris France Invited Presentation: Fyssen Symposium: Co-operation during human evolution, Paris, France. Invited Presentation: HEIRS Opening Symposium: Human Evolution, Faro, Portugal. |
| 2024 | Keynote: Portugaliae Genetica, Porto, Portugal. Invited Presentation: Human Evolution and the Palaeolithic seminar, University of Vienna, Austria. Invited Presentation: International Symposium on Xiahe Baishiya Karst Cave Site and Denisovans, Lanzhou University , China. Invited Presentation: Workshop on the Evolution of Incompatibilities, Centre for Advanced Studies, Ludwig-Maximilians University Munich, Germany. Invited Presentation & Instructor: Workshop on Ancient DNA, Switzerland. |
| 2023 | Keynote: ISMB-ECCB. Lyon, France. Keynote: RSU-ISC 2023, Riga, Latvia. Invited Presentation: Genome Informatics, Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory, USA. Symposium "Genotype-Phenotype Interactions”, University of Tübingen, Germany German Human Genome-Phenome Archive (GHGA) Lecture series. |
| 2022 | International Society for Applied Biological Sciences (ISABS 2022), Dubrovnik, Croatia. Keynote: Boston Evolutionary Genetics Supergroup, Boston, USA. Keynote: 100xCiencia, Barcelona, Spain. Keynote: German Conference on Bioinformatics (GCB), Halle, Germany. Invited talk: EMBL Symposium - Reconstructing the human past: using ancient and modern genomics. |
Publications
Gallery
