Education
PhD Epidemiology, University of Wisconsin (Madison), 2018
BS Cognitive Science, University of California (San Diego), 2009
Contact
206-667-1036
bdarst@fredhutch.org
1100 Fairview Ave N
Seattle, WA 98109
Bio
Dr. Burcu Darst’s is a genetic epidemiologist with research focused on identifying and understanding genetic and multi-omic risk factors of complex diseases in diverse populations, particularly how they relate to health disparities. Her research lies predominantly in studying prostate cancer, type 2 diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease, with the underlying goal of identifying risk factors that could prevent the onset and health disparities of these diseases. Dr. Darst’s research is based on a variety of approaches, including using rare genetic variants captured with genomic sequencing, genome-wide association studies, polygenic risk scores, and metabolomics to understand disease risk. Currently, she is leading an effort to improve understanding of the genomic and metabolic mechanisms contributing to prostate cancer risk in men from diverse populations as well as improving the utility of polygenic risk scores and rare genetic variants for the prediction of prostate cancer across multi-ancestry patient populations.This research is conducted in collaboration with large-scale international collaborations investigating genetic risk of prostate cancer.
Research Interests
Prostate cancer prevention, Health disparities, Genetic risk factors, Molecular biomarkers, Multi-omic integration
Recent Publications (PubMed)
(2024 Jun 17)
Genet Epidemiol
Jiang L, Shen J, Darst BF, Haiman CA, Mancuso N, Conti DV
(2024 May 24)
Elife 12():
Yan D, Hu B, Darst BF, Mukherjee S, Kunkle BW, Deming Y, Dumitrescu L, Wang Y, Naj A, Kuzma A, Zhao Y, Kang H, Johnson SC, Carlos C, Hohman TJ, Crane PK, Engelman CD, Alzheimer’s Disease Genetics Consortium (ADGC), Lu Q
(2024 Apr)
Eur Urol Oncol 7(2): 248-257
Saunders EJ, Dadaev T, Brook MN, Wakerell S, Govindasami K, Rageevakumar R, Hussain N, Osborne A, Keating D, Lophatananon A, Muir KR, UKGPCS Collaborators, Darst BF, Conti DV, Haiman CA, Antoniou AC, Eeles RA, Kote-Jarai Z
(2024 Feb 13)
Neurology 102(3): e208116
Park SY, Setiawan VW, Crimmins EM, White LR, Wu AH, Cheng I, Darst BF, Haiman CA, Wilkens LR, Le Marchand L, Lim U
(2024 Jan)
Nat Metab 6(1): 187
Fuller H, Zhu Y, Nicholas J, Chatelaine HA, Drzymalla EM, Sarvestani AK, Julián-Serrano S, Tahir UA, Sinnott-Armstrong N, Raffield LM, Rahnavard A, Hua X, Shutta KH, Darst BF
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