Programme
Tuesday, August 25th, 2026
Registration
OPENING OF THE CONFERENCE
Welcome by Mart Saarma,
the President of Estonian Academy of Science
Welcome by Mait Metspalu
Head of Program Committee
Anniversary Keynote talks
Moderator Andres Metspalu
Sir Peter Donnelly (Keynote)
FMedSci, HonFIA
CEO and Co-Founder, Genomics Ltd,
Emeritus Professor, University of Oxford, UK
“Implementing Genomic Prevention: how genomics can power a new prevention-first agenda for healthcare”
André Uitterlinden
Professor Complex Genetics, Internal Medicine Dept. Erasmus University MC,
Head Laboratory for Population Genomics, Netherlands
"The Genome of Europe: Towards using Genetic Information in Health Care and Prevention"
Coffee break
Anniversary session I
Moderator Andres Metspalu
Matt Brown
King’s College London, UK
“Designing Genomics for Prevention, Equity, and Impact: England’s Life-Course Approach”
Emma Duncan
Professor of Clinical Endocrinology at King’s College London, UK
"The intersection of common and rare disease genetics in bone disorders"
Lina Basel-Salmon
Director of Innovation and Research in Genomic Medicine, Maccabi Healthcare Services, Israel
"Population-Scale Return of Secondary Findings: Yield, Challenges, and Implementation Lessons"
Lunch Break
Anniversary session II
Moderator Andres Metspalu
Lene Cividanes
Head of Division at the Danish Health Data Authority, Denmark
"Five years with the Danish National Genome Center"
Alexandre Reymond
Center for Integrative Genomics, University of Lausanne, Switzerland
"Variable expressivity, reduced penetrance, pleiotropy and inheritance modes"
Coffee break
Anniversary session III
Moderator Andres Metspalu
Jens K. Habermann
Director General BBMRI-ERIC, Board certified Human Geneticist, Leave of Absence Professorship University of Lübeck, Germany
"How BBMRI-ERIC structures the European Research Area on examples of Cancer Mission, EOSC Federation and Personalized Medicine"
Thomas Illig
CEO of the Hannover Unified Biobank, Hannover Medical School, Germany
"Biobanking as a basis for integration of molecular data in complex diseases."
Michaela Mayrhofer
CEO for Papillon Pathways & Lead ELSI, Institute of Human Genetics, Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria
"Navigating Complexity in Europe’s Health Future: An Ethical Perspective"
POSTER SESSION presentations
Moderator Triin Laisk
Francesca Rosamilia
Postdoctoral researcher at Clinical Bioinformatic Unit, IRCCS Giannina Gaslini Institut in Italy and Visiting postdoctoral researcher at FIMM, University of Helsinki, Finland
"Predictive utility of childhood polygenic scores for adult disease risk and inform early-life prevention"
Mikk Tooming
Junior Researcher at University of Tartu and Senior Research & Development Laboratory Specialist at Tartu University Hospital, Estonia
"Potential Founder BRCA2 Germline Genetic Variant in Estonia"
Anne-Mai Ilumäe
Research Fellow of Population Genetics at Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu
"Maternal contacts across the Baltic Sea – thousands of mitogenomes reveal maternal genetic structure and recent expansions in the CircumBaltic region"
POSTER SESSION
Dinner at Estonian National Museum
Announcing the winner of Artur Lind Scholarship
Wednesday, August 26th, 2026
Human genome complexity
Moderator Lili Milani
Evan Eichler (Keynote talk)
Department of Genome Sciences and Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, USA
“Complex structural variation and disease”
Pille Hallast
Research Scientist, The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine, USA
“Why the Y? Long-read assemblies and new insights into diversity and mutation in complex genomic regions”
Maarja Jõeloo
Postdoctoral research fellow, Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland (FIMM), University of Helsinki, Finland
“Integrating structural variants and tandem repeats into biobank-scale association studies”
Coffee break
Advances in single cell technology.
Moderator Kaur Alasoo
Nicole Soranzo (Keynote talk)
Head of Genomics Research Centre, Human Technopole, Italy
“A population-scale single-cell resource of 10M peripheral blood cells with embedded medical data in a multiethnic setting”
Daniela Ungureanu
University of Oulu, Finland
“A 96-Plex Pharmacotranscriptomic Platform to Decode Drug Resistance at Single Cell Level in Cancers”
Minna Kaikkonen-Määttä
Professor of Cardiovascular Genomics and Director of the Single Cell Genomics Core at University of Eastern Finland.
"Decoding the Cellular and Spatial Architecture of Genetic Risk in Coronary Artery Disease"
Jeroen Adema Segment Sales Manager, Illumina
"The genome and beyond: the path from innovation to impact"
Lunch Break
Population genomics
Moderator Michael Dannemann
Molly Przeworski (Keynote talk)
Alan H. Kempner Professor of Biological Sciences
Columbia University
“Why do germline mutation rates vary among humans?”
Hakhamanesh Mostafavi
Assistant Professor, Center for Human Genetics and Genomics, Department of Population Health, NYU Grossman School of Medicine
“What genes do genetic association studies discover?”
Guy Jacobs
Assistant Professor in Human Evolutionary Genetics and Bioinformatics, University of Cambridge, UK
“From hosts to microbes: a genomic lens across social networks, lifestyle and history in rural Indonesia”
Coffee break
Microbiome
Session Co-organised by Nordic Summer School on Computational Microbiome Research and with the support of Baltic-American Freedom Foundation
Rob Knight (Keynote talk)Wolfe Family Endowed Chair in Microbiome Research at Rady Children's Director, Center for Microbiome Innovation, and Professor, Department of Pediatrics, Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Shu Chien-Gene Lay Department of Bioengineering, and Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute, UC San Diego Senior Visiting Fellow, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Jockey Club Institute for Advanced Study
“Implementing Microbiome Research within the Personalized Medicine Paradigm"
Jeroen RaesKU Leuven, Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Transplantation, Rega Institute for Medical Research and VIB, Center for Microbiology, Belgium
“Quantitative microbiome profiling in health and disease"
Jingyuan FuProfessor, Department of Genetics, University Medical Center Groningen, the Netherlands
"Microbial genetic diversity in human health and disease"