Dr. Lynn Jorde has been on the faculty of the University of Utah School of Medicine since 1979 and holds the Mark and Kathie Miller Presidential Endowed Chair in Human Genetics. He served as Chair of the Department of Human Genetics from 2009 to 2024. Dr. Jorde’s laboratory has published more than 250 peer-reviewed scientific articles on human genetic variation, high-altitude adaptation, the genetic basis of human limb malformations, and the genetics of common diseases such as autism, hypertension, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, and inflammatory bowel disease.
Dr. Jorde is the lead author of Medical Genetics, a textbook that is now in its 6th edition and translated into five foreign languages. He has received 12 teaching awards at the University of Utah School of Medicine, including the Outstanding Pre-Clinical Professor Awards from the graduating medical classes of 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005; the Leonard W. Jarcho Distinguished Teaching Award in 2003; the University of Utah Distinguished Teaching Award in 2006; and the 2008 Award for Excellence in Education from the American Society of Human Genetics.
Dr. Jorde was elected as President of the 8,000-member American Society of Human Genetics in 2011, and he became a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2012. In 2024, he completed a four-year term with the National Advisory Council of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the NIH. He is the Co-Director of the University of Utah Center for Genomic Medicine
In addition to his academic pursuits, Dr. Jorde is an avid hiker and cross-country skier, and he enjoys photography, gardening, traveling, and playing the piano. He has the peculiar distinction of once having been invited to appear on the Jerry Springer Show.
