David Smith's Biography

David Smith, Professor, Mayo Clinic

David I Smith is a Professor and Consultant in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the Mayo Clinic where he’s been for the past 19 years. He received his Bachelors degree from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in Mathematics and Molecular Biology in 1974 and his Ph.D. also at U.W. Madison in the Department of Biochemistry in 1978. He had postdoctoral training at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and at the University of California, Irvine, before joining the faculty at Wayne State University in Detroit in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics where he was for 11 years. In 1995 in joined the Mayo Clinic. His laboratory works on studying the molecular alterations that underlie cancer development and he also studies the role that the common fragile sites play in cancer development. He is also the Chairman of the Technology Assessment Group for the Center for Individualized Medicine of the Mayo Clinic and is responsible for evaluating new technologies that could have a dramatic impact on research and its clinical translation. The most exciting technology with tremendous potential to transform both research and clinical practice is next generation sequencing and Dr. Smith has been using this powerful technology to study the role that human papillomavirus plays in the development of a number of different cancers.