Nicholas James Patterson (born 9 June 1947) is a mathematician working as a staff scientist at the

Broad Institute The Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (IPA: , pronunciation respelling: ), often referred to as the Broad Institute, is a biomedical and genomic research center located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U ...

with notable contributions to the area of computational genomics. His work has appeared in scientific journals such as ''

Nature Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physics, physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomenon, phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. ...

'', ''

Science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

'' and ''

Nature Genetics ''Nature Genetics'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Nature Portfolio. It was established in 1992. It covers research in genetics. The chief editor is Tiago Faial. The journal encompasses genetic and functional genomic studi ...

''. His research has brought a better understanding of

early human migrations Early human migrations are the earliest migrations and expansions of archaic and modern humans across continents. They are believed to have begun approximately 2 million years ago with the early expansions out of Africa by '' Homo erect ...

. He is among the group of scientists who have sequenced the

Neanderthal genome Genetic studies on Neanderthal ancient DNA became possible in the late 1990s. The Neanderthal genome project, established in 2006, presented the first fully sequenced Neanderthal genome in 2013. Since 2005, evidence for substantial admixture of ...

in 2010. This was followed by the sequencing of a much higher quality

Neanderthal Neanderthals (, also ''Homo neanderthalensis'' and erroneously ''Homo sapiens neanderthalensis''), also written as Neandertals, are an extinct species or subspecies of archaic humans who lived in Eurasia until about 40,000 years ago. While th ...

genome, where the subject was from the

Altai Mountains The Altai Mountains (), also spelled Altay Mountains, are a mountain range in Central Asia, Central and East Asia, where Russia, China, Mongolia and Kazakhstan converge, and where the rivers Irtysh and Ob River, Ob have their headwaters. The m ...

, in 2014. These studies have uncovered some unexpected facts about the interbreeding between archaic and modern humans.

Biography

Patterson was an only child who grew up in the

Bayswater Bayswater is an area within the City of Westminster in West London. It is a built-up district with a population density of 17,500 per square kilometre, and is located between Kensington Gardens to the south, Paddington to the north-east, and ...

section of central London. Patterson received his B.A. and Ph.D. in mathematics at

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. His doctoral advisor was

John G. Thompson John Griggs Thompson (born October 13, 1932) is an American mathematician at the University of Florida noted for his work in the field of finite groups. He was awarded the Fields Medal in 1970, the Wolf Prize in 1992, and the Abel Prize in 2008. ...

. He initially worked for the British code-breaking agency GCHQ and the

Center for Communications Research Center or centre may refer to: Mathematics *Center (geometry), the middle of an object * Center (algebra), used in various contexts ** Center (group theory) ** Center (ring theory) * Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentricity ...

in Princeton. Following this cryptology work, Patterson worked at the quantitative trading firm

Renaissance Technologies Renaissance Technologies LLC, also known as RenTech or RenTec, is an American hedge fund based in East Setauket, New York, on Long Island, which specializes in systematic trading using quantitative models derived from mathematical and statisti ...

. In 2001, Patterson joined the Center for Genome Research at MIT, the

Whitehead Institute Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research is a non-profit research institute located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States that is dedicated to improving human health through basic biomedical research. It was founded as a fiscally indepen ...

. He briefly worked on gene expression data applied to cancer before switching to the study of human genetics. In 2012, Patterson developed

ADMIXTOOLS ADMIXTOOLS (or AdmixTools) is an R software package that is primarily used for analyzing admixture in population genetics. The initial version was originally developed by Nick Patterson and colleagues in 2012. The second reimplemented version, ...

, a software package written in R that is currently widely used by population geneticists.

Chess

Nick Patterson was a child chess prodigy. He won the

Irish Chess Championship The Irish Chess Championship is the national Championship of Ireland, currently run by the Irish Chess Union ( ICU), the FIDE-recognised governing body for the game. Below is the list of champions. The first champion was J.A. Porterfield Rynd, wh ...

in 1969. In a long game in the Chess Olympiad of Siegen in 1970, where he played top board for Ireland, he met the Danish grandmaster Bent Larsen, who was one of the top 10 players in the world at the time, and managed to make a draw after 93 moves.

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Patterson, Nick Living people 1947 births American geneticists Broad Institute people Alumni of the University of Cambridge Chess Olympiad competitors Irish chess players Phylogenetics researchers