Zachary Szpiech

Assistant Professor of Biology

zps5164@psu.edu

Research Summary

Population and evolutionary genetics, with applications to medical genetics, anthropology, and conservation

Huck Graduate Students

Huck Affiliations

Bioinformatics and Genomics

Molecular, Cellular, and Integrative Biosciences

Publication Tags

These publication tags are generated from the output of this researcher. Click any tag below to view other Huck researchers working on the same topic.

Genome Haplotypes Genes Population Asthma Macaca Mulatta Genomics Mutation History Genetic Variation Loci Linux Availability Precision Medicine Gene Histidine Local Adaptation Mutant Proteins National Heart, Lung, And Blood Institute (U.S.) Genotype Macrophages Whole Genome Sequencing Chromosomes Statistics Genetic Selection

Most Recent Publications

The Maintenance of Deleterious Variation in Wild Chinese Rhesus Macaques

Camille Steux, Zachary A. Szpiech, 2024, Genome Biology and Evolution

Selscan 2.0: Scanning for sweeps in unphased data

Zachary A. Szpiech, 2024, Bioinformatics

Genomes of the extinct Bachman's warbler show high divergence and no evidence of admixture with other extant Vermivora warblers

Andrew W. Wood, Zachary A. Szpiech, Irby J. Lovette, Brian Tilston Smith, David Toews, 2023, Current Biology on p. 2823-2829.e4

A rarefaction approach for measuring population differences in rare and common variation

Daniel J. Cotter, Elyssa F. Hofgard, John Novembre, Zachary A. Szpiech, Noah A. Rosenberg, 2023, Genetics

A genetic and linguistic analysis of the admixture histories of the islands of Cabo Verde

Romain Laurent, Zachary A. Szpiech, Sergio S. da Costa, Valentin Thouzeau, Cesar A. Fortes-Lima, Françoise Dessarps-Freichey, Laure Lémée, José Utgé, Noah A. Rosenberg, Marlyse Baptista, Paul Verdu, 2023, eLife

Evolution of genes involved in the unusual genitals of the bear macaque, Macaca arctoides

Laurie S. Stevison, Nick P. Bailey, Zachary A. Szpiech, Taylor E. Novak, Don J. Melnick, Ben J. Evans, Jeffrey D. Wall, 2022, Ecology and Evolution

A spatially aware likelihood test to detect sweeps from haplotype distributions

Michael DeGiorgio, Zachary A. Szpiech, 2022, PLoS Genetics

Application of a novel haplotype-based scan for local adaptation to study high-altitude adaptation in rhesus macaques

Zachary A. Szpiech, Taylor E. Novak, Nick P. Bailey, Laurie S. Stevison, 2021, Evolution Letters on p. 408-421

Sequencing of 53,831 diverse genomes from the NHLBI TOPMed Program

Daniel Taliun, Daniel N. Harris, Michael D. Kessler, Jedidiah Carlson, Zachary A. Szpiech, Raul Torres, Sarah A.Gagliano Taliun, André Corvelo, Stephanie M. Gogarten, Hyun Min Kang, Achilleas N. Pitsillides, Jonathon LeFaive, Seung been Lee, Xiaowen Tian, Brian L. Browning, Sayantan Das, Anne Katrin Emde, Wayne E. Clarke, Douglas P. Loesch, Amol C. Shetty, Thomas W. Blackwell, Albert V. Smith, Quenna Wong, Xiaoming Liu, Matthew P. Conomos, Dean M. Bobo, François Aguet, Christine Albert, Alvaro Alonso, Kristin G. Ardlie, Dan E. Arking, Stella Aslibekyan, Paul L. Auer, John Barnard, R. Graham Barr, Lucas Barwick, Lewis C. Becker, Rebecca L. Beer, Emelia J. Benjamin, Lawrence F. Bielak, John Blangero, Michael Boehnke, Donald W. Bowden, Jennifer A. Brody, Esteban G. Burchard, Brian E. Cade, James F. Casella, Brandon Chalazan, Daniel I. Chasman, Yii Der Ida Chen, 2021, Nature on p. 290-299

Association study in African-admixed populations across the Americas recapitulates asthma risk loci in non-African populations

Michelle Daya, Nicholas Rafaels, Tonya M. Brunetti, Sameer Chavan, Albert M. Levin, Aniket Shetty, Christopher R. Gignoux, Meher Preethi Boorgula, Genevieve Wojcik, Monica Campbell, Candelaria Vergara, Dara G. Torgerson, Victor E. Ortega, Ayo Doumatey, Henry Richard Johnston, Nathalie Acevedo, Maria Ilma Araujo, Pedro C. Avila, Gillian Belbin, Eugene Bleecker, Carlos Bustamante, Luis Caraballo, Alvaro Cruz, Georgia M. Dunston, Celeste Eng, Mezbah U. Faruque, Trevor S. Ferguson, Camila Figueiredo, Jean G. Ford, Weiniu Gan, Pierre Antoine Gourraud, Nadia N. Hansel, Ryan D. Hernandez, Edwin Francisco Herrera-Paz, Silvia Jiménez, Eimear E. Kenny, Jennifer Knight-Madden, Rajesh Kumar, Leslie A. Lange, Ethan M. Lange, Antoine Lizee, Pissamai Maul, Trevor Maul, Alvaro Mayorga, Deborah Meyers, Dan L. Nicolae, Timothy D. O’Connor, Ricardo Riccio Oliveira, Christopher O. Olopade, Zachary A. Szpiech, 2019, Nature Communications

Most-Cited Papers

Sequencing of 53,831 diverse genomes from the NHLBI TOPMed Program

Selscan: An efficient multithreaded program to perform EHH-based scans for positive selection

Zachary A. Szpiech, Ryan D. Hernandez, 2014, Molecular Biology and Evolution on p. 2824-2827

Genetic Ancestry and Natural Selection Drive Population Differences in Immune Responses to Pathogens

Yohann Nédélec, Joaquín Sanz, Golshid Baharian, Zachary A. Szpiech, Alain Pacis, Anne Dumaine, Jean Christophe Grenier, Andrew Freiman, Aaron J. Sams, Steven Hebert, Ariane Pagé Sabourin, Francesca Luca, Ran Blekhman, Ryan D. Hernandez, Roger Pique-Regi, Jenny Tung, Vania Yotova, Luis B. Barreiro, 2016, Cell on p. 657-669.e21

Whole-Genome sequencing of pharmacogenetic drug response in racially diverse children with asthma

Angel C.Y. Mak, Marquitta J. White, Walter L. Eckalbar, Zachary A. Szpiech, Sam S. Oh, Maria Pino-Yanes, Donglei Hu, Paǵe Goddard, Scott Huntsman, Joshua Galanter, Ann Chen Wu, Blanca E. Himes, Soren Germer, Julia M. Vogel, Karen L. Bunting, Celeste Eng, Sandra Salazar, Kevin L. Keys, Jennifer Liberto, Thomas J. Nuckton, Thomas A. Nguyen, Dara G. Torgerson, Pui Yan Kwok, Albert M. Levin, Juan C. Celedón, Erick Forno, Hakon Hakonarson, Patrick M. Sleiman, Amber Dahlin, Kelan G. Tantisira, Scott T. Weiss, Denise Serebrisky, Emerita Brigino-Buenaventura, Harold J. Farber, Kelley Meade, Michael A. Lenoir, Pedro C. Avila, Saunak Sen, Shannon M. Thyne, William Rodriguez-Cintron, Cheryl A. Winkler, Andŕes Moreno-Estrada, Karla Sandoval, Jose R. Rodriguez-Santana, Rajesh Kumar, L. Keoki Williams, Nadav Ahituv, Elad Ziv, Max A. Seibold, Robert B. Darnell, Noah Zaitlen, Ryan D. Hernandez, Esteban G. Burchard, 2018, American Review of Respiratory Disease on p. 1552-1564

Association study in African-admixed populations across the Americas recapitulates asthma risk loci in non-African populations

Cancer-associated arginine-to-histidine mutations confer a gain in pH sensing to mutant proteins

Katharine A. White, Diego Garrido Ruiz, Zachary A. Szpiech, Nicolas B. Strauli, Ryan D. Hernandez, Matthew P. Jacobson, Diane L. Barber, 2017, Science's STKE : signal transduction knowledge environment

Human demographic history has amplified the effects of background selection across the genome

Raul Torres, Zachary A. Szpiech, Ryan D. Hernandez, 2018, PLoS Genetics

Ancestry-Dependent Enrichment of Deleterious Homozygotes in Runs of Homozygosity

Zachary A. Szpiech, Angel C.Y. Mak, Marquitta J. White, Donglei Hu, Celeste Eng, Esteban G. Burchard, Ryan D. Hernandez, 2019, American Journal of Human Genetics on p. 747-762

Application of a novel haplotype-based scan for local adaptation to study high-altitude adaptation in rhesus macaques

Zachary A. Szpiech, Taylor E. Novak, Nick P. Bailey, Laurie S. Stevison, 2021, Evolution Letters on p. 408-421

GARLIC: Genomic Autozygosity Regions Likelihood-based Inference and Classification

Zachary A. Szpiech, Alexandra Blant, Trevor J. Pemberton, 2017, Bioinformatics on p. 2059-2062

News Articles Featuring Zachary Szpiech

May 29, 2024

Complete X and Y chromosome sequences of living great ape species determined

Newly generated, complete “end-to-end” reference genomes for the sex chromosomes of five great ape species and one lesser ape species — produced by an international collaborative team led by researchers at Penn State, the National Human Genome Research Institute and the University of Washington — highlight extremely rapid changes on the male-specific Y chromosome among ape species.

Full Article

Jun 23, 2023

Extinct warbler’s genome sequenced from museum specimens

The Bachman’s warbler, a songbird that was last seen in North America nearly 40 years ago, was a distinct species and not a hybrid of its two living sister species, according a new study in which the full genomes of seven museum specimens of the bird were sequenced.