John Doench, Ph.D.

John Doench is the director of research and development in the Genetic Perturbation Platform of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, where he is also an institute scientist. In that capacity, he provides expert guidance on the design, execution, and analysis of genetic screens. He has contributed to numerous publications in fields such as infectious disease, cancer biology, and immunology, highlighting both his commitment to team-based science and ability to mentor and guide scientists from diverse backgrounds on the critical principles of genetic screens.

Additionally, Doench leads a group focused on the development of functional genomic techniques, first with RNAi and more recently with CRISPR technology. Here, his team demonstrated the potential of genetic screens with CRISPR and has since developed leading bioinformatics tools and screening libraries to enable community-wide usage of this powerful technology. Importantly, their efforts emphasize not only staying on the cutting edge of the newest approaches, but also focusing on making technologies widely available and useful, which is critical for enabling collaboration with a broader community of researchers working in diverse and challenging model systems.

Doench received the Broad Institute Excellence Award in Collaboration in 2013 and was named as the Merkin Institute Fellow in the same year. In 2018 he received the Broad Institute Award. He proudly serves on the advisory board for Addgene, a non-profit plasmid repository, and has been active in the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening (SLAS), serving as co-chair for their annual meeting in 2019. Doench also serves as vice-chair of professional scientists at the Broad.

Prior to joining the Broad in 2009, Doench did his postdoctoral work at Harvard Medical School, received his Ph.D. from the biology department at MIT, working in Phil Sharp’s lab, and majored in history at Hamilton College.