Christopher Desjardins
Research/Areas of Interest
Bioinformatics, Drug discovery & development
Education
- Doctor of Philosophy, Univ. of Maryland, USA
- Bachelor of Science, Cornell University, USA
Biography
Dr Chris Desjardins is a Professor of the Practice of Bioinformatics in the Department of Biology at Tufts University. He earned his BS in Biology from Cornell University and his PhD in Entomology from the University of Maryland, followed by postdoctoral work in bioinformatics and genomics at The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR) and the University of Rochester. He subsequently spent eight years as a staff scientist at the Broad Institute in the Infectious Disease and Microbiome Program, studying the genetic basis of pathogenicity and drug resistance in organisms ranging from bacteria to fungi to filarial nematodes. He then moved into biotech, working at four different companies spanning microbiome therapeutics, genetic medicine, and biobank-scale data engineering. In industry, Dr. Desjardins has partnered closely with experimental biologists, software engineers, and clinical scientists from early discovery through clinical trials. He's particularly interested in leveraging bioinformatics to translate biological discoveries into therapeutics, and accelerating that process with agentic AI by amplifying, rather than replacing, human creativity and decision-making. At Tufts, Dr. Desjardins teaches courses on bioinformatics aimed at MS students and advanced undergraduates, and mentors biology students on careers spanning non-profit research, healthcare and industry.