Dr Maya Ghoussaini

Maya obtained her PhD in Molecular Genetics and Epidemiology from the Pasteur Institute in Lille, during which she worked on the identification and functional characterization of genetic variants of predisposition to Obesity and Type 2 Diabetes in the French population.

She then joined the University of Cambridge. Using Genome Wide Association Studies, she identified new regions in the human genome associated with cancer, and causative variants within these regions, furthering our understanding of how such variants affect cancer susceptibility and pathogenesis.

Maya joined Open Targets, where she leads the Genetic Analysis team, focusing on using human genetics and functional genomics data to guide therapeutic target identification and prioritisiation, inform drug repositioning and predict toxicity effects.