Tim Hunkapiller

Biography

 Dr. Hunkapiller received his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology in Molecular Biology, and most recently has held a Research Assistant Professor appointment in the Department of Molecular Biotechnology at the University of Washington.  Dr. Hunkapiller's research focus has included molecular immunology, evolution, computational genetics, comparative genomics and he is an expert on the genetics, genomic organization and functional diversity of the immune system. He has also been involved in bioinformatics, algorithm and database development, and experimental process optimization, for 20 years. While at Caltech, Dr. Hunkapiller originated the model for the automated, fluorescent DNA sequencer. The manifestation of this idea in products such as the ABI 3700tm and the MD Megabasetm sequencers catalyzed and enabled the completion of the first drafts of the Human Genome.  He continues to work with Applied Biosystems on improving the throughput and quality of data from these instruments and their associated chemistry. Dr. Hunkapiller also developed the first operational special-purpose computer hardware to accelerate the analysis of biological sequence information.

Research Interest

 Oncology