Benjamin Solomon, M.D.

Genetic conditions, though often individually rare, are common in aggregate, and disproportionately impact patients, families, healthcare systems, and society. New and evolving technologies have dramatically improved the ability to diagnose and care for affected individuals with many different disorders.

Recent developments in applying artificial intelligence (AI) and related computational techniques – including deep learning (DL) – have demonstrated strong potential to address biologic and health-related questions, including in genomics. Realizing the full value of these technologies requires further investigation, particularly given the rapid pace of innovation in the field.

The overall goal of Dr. Solomon's research group is therefore to apply advanced computational approaches, especially involving AI and DL, to develop, test, and implement methods of interrogating datasets relevant to genetic conditions. The research involves analyzing clinical/phenotypic information such as medical records and images, as well as genomic and related biologic data. Combining multiple types of data can enable novel insights as well as flexible analytic models. Improving these methods can allow more efficient and accurate investigations into many aspects of human health and disease.

The research aims to explore questions that are both scientifically important and directly relevant to clinical care. The goal is to produce results that can lead to tools that enable researchers to study and understand genetic conditions and clinicians to better manage patients and families. While some investigations will be conducted using data from specific conditions in proof-of-principle scenarios, the general methods are largely agnostic to any particular condition. That is, these methods can be applied broadly across the field of medical genomics.

Dr. Solomon earned his medical degree from Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. He completed medical training in pediatrics and clinical genetics through a joint Children's National/National Human Genome Research Institute program. After graduating from this program, he remained at NHGRI for several years as a Staff Clinician, where his work focused on understanding the causes and biology of congenital disorders as well as applying emerging technologies and analytic approaches to genomic and phenotypic datasets.

Dr. Solomon joined the Inova Translational Medicine Institute (ITMI) in 2013 as the Chief of the Division of Medical Genomics. In this role, he led a team of clinicians, bioinformaticists, and bench-based scientists to deliver clinical care and conduct genomic research. In 2016, he became the Managing Director of GeneDx, a genetics and genomics diagnostic company with a strong emphasis on research and the discovery of novel causes of disease. In this role, he led a team of over 400 molecular geneticists, genetic counselors, and laboratory and research staff. He returned to NHGRI in 2019 as Clinical Director, where he supports NHGRI's clinical research program and works closely with other NIH investigators and teams.

Throughout his career, Dr. Solomon has been an avid participant in genomics education, including formal and informal teaching of medical students, residents, fellows, doctoral, postdoctoral, and other trainees, as well as educating clinical and scientific communities about genomics and related computational approaches. Dr. Solomon has authored and co-authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers, commentaries, book chapters and has written and edited several books.