Rate My Professor Omer Gokcumen

Omer Gokcumen is a Professor of Biological Sciences at the University at Buffalo, recognized as an expert in evolutionary anthropology. He earned his PhD in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania in 2008 and completed postdoctoral research at Harvard Medical School. Joining the University at Buffalo initially as an assistant professor around 2017, he progressed to associate professor and was promoted to full professor. Gokcumen directs the Buffalo Evolutionary and Anthropological Genomics Laboratory (BEAGL), which investigates the contributions of genomic structural variations—deletions, duplications, and other large-scale changes—to human evolution, beyond single nucleotide variants. His research integrates genomics, functional genetics, anthropology, and evolutionary biology to explore mutational mechanisms, evolutionary processes preserving archaic variants shared with Neanderthals, and functional effects at genetic, transcriptomic, cellular, and organismal levels in modern and ancient human populations, including Denisovans.