Strategic Planning: How Can DNA and Other Identity Technologies Address Migration and Human Trafficking?
(Room :)
20 Sep 16
11:45 AM
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12:15 PM
The audience will be engaged in developing a strategy for how DNA and other human identity technologies can be adapted to address the global human trafficking issue.
Alexa Barrett, Filmmaker and Sara Katsanis of Duke University will participate in the discussion.
Alexa Barrett is a filmmaker who has written, directed, edited and produced ten films that have won awards in international film festivals. Her passion for film began at 15, when she created a documentary that was used at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, D.C. and physical rehabilitation centers to inspire the families of soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with brain injuries. Alexa graduated Duke University Cum Laude with High Honors in International Comparative Studies with a focus in Latin America. Her experience living and studying abroad in Latin America, Europe and Asia, and working for the U.S. Department of State in the Bureau of Populations, Refugees and Migration, inspired her to delve into the politics of refugees and research ways of reuniting them with their families. Alexa now works in New York and the UK as the Global Project & Client Associate at ROI Training.
Sara H. Katsanis is an Instructor in Science & Society at Duke University who joined Duke in 2009. Her research focuses on policy options for genetic testing applications in medicine and law enforcement and how genetic technologies affect individuals. She has explored direct-to-consumer genetic testing, pharmacogenetics drug labeling, familial searching of CODIS, and surreptitious collection of DNA. She is also delving into policy options for the applications of kinship analyses to identify victims of human trafficking and adoption fraud.
Katsanis received a MS in Medical Genetics from Brunel University in 1997 having completed her research thesis at Imperial College School of Medicine at St. Mary's in London, UK. From 1998-2002, she worked in Houston, TX, first as a DNA Analyst in the forensic laboratory at the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office, then as an Associate Scientist managing the genotyping facility at Lexicon Genetics, Inc. In 2002, she joined Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD as Laboratory Manager for the DNA Diagnostic Laboratory, responsible for oversight and supervision of clinical diagnostic testing. In 2006, Katsanis began working with the Genetics & Public Policy Center within the Berman Institute of Bioethics at Johns Hopkins in Washington, DC. She contributed to the Center's efforts to address legal, ethics, and policy issues related to human reproductive genetic technologies, genetic testing quality and oversight, and public engagement in genetic testing and research.