Growing Goodness

Direct-to-consumer genetic testing is very popular and has many benefits and risks. Some of those include understanding genetic predispositions to disease, learning ancestral heritage, risking loss of privacy, locating biological relatives, and even helping to solve cold-case crimes via genetic genealogy. This short course will discuss how to understand and interpret direct-to-consumer DNA testing results.

To get the most benefit from the course, participants are recommended to obtain and complete 23andMe Health+Ancestry direct-to-consumer DNA testing ahead of the first class meeting. If you are unable to or do not wish to complete testing, a sample report will be provided to you. Testing kits may be purchased directly from the company. Participants are encouraged to read the company's privacy policy prior to testing: https://www.23andme.com/about/privacy/.

Disclosure: This business is not affiliated with JMU or the JMU Lifelong Learning Institute. The recommendation of this kit is based on the company being one of the first to provide direct-to-consumer DNA testing kits.

Dr. Anne Henriksen is Faculty Emerita at James Madison University, where she was a professor in the Integrated Science and Technology Department for 19 years. She received a Ph.D. in chemical physics from the University of Virginia and an MBA in management science from the University of New Mexico. She has spent the last decade studying neuroscience, neuropharmacology, neuroendocrinology, genomics, and bioinformatics.

There are no scheduled sessions at this time. Sign up to be notified when this course is available.