Podcast recap: Sonya Dumanis and Andy Singleton on building a global genetics engine for Parkinson’s
On the most recent episode of The Genetics Podcast, we hosted Sonya Dumanis and Andy Singleton to unpack GP2, the Global Parkinson’s Genetics Program. GP2 is a ten-year effort to map Parkinson’s genetics at global scale and make the data broadly available, so researchers can move faster on mechanisms, biomarkers, and therapies.
At the Partnerships with Sites summit in September 2025, new data from the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development (Tufts CSDD) underscored how the global site landscape is shifting and what this means for trial sponsors. Joan A. Chambers, Senior Consultant at Tufts CSDD, led a session that provided an insightful look at what sponsors need to know now.
Advocating for patients is one of the core pillars of Sano’s mission. Our approach to clinical trials is patient-centered and entails deep and meaningful engagement with patients and participants. This may include providing education, genetic testing, or support to embark on the clinical trial process.
Rare disease trials are among the most challenging to design and execute. Patient populations are small and hard to reach, and personal and disease-related burdens make participation difficult. Overcoming these challenges requires a combination of thoughtful trial design and compassion for patients and families who agree to participate in trials.
In last week’s episode of The Genetics Podcast, Patrick Short sat down with Wanda Smith, founder of CureGRN and long-time advocate for families affected by progranulin-related frontotemporal dementia (FTD). Wanda has spent decades helping brain and plasma banks, connecting with scientists, and helping families. In this blog, we cover how Wanda became involved with FTD and the impact of her work.
At this year’s DPHARM conference, Sano’s VP of Commercial, Ben Jackson, joined a panel on clinical trial patient matching moderated by a clinical expert from Novartis. Panelists included representatives from sponsors like BMS and Merck, vendors like Tempus, and research sites too – all sharing perspectives on one of the industry’s most pressing challenges: how to effectively match patients to trials while building trust across the ecosystem. In this blog, we highlight some key takeaways from the discussion.
On the most recent episode of The Genetics Podcast, we hosted Terry Pirovolakis, founder and CEO of Elpida Therapeutics. Terry’s journey began the day his young son Michael was diagnosed with SPG50, an ultra-rare disease with no available treatments. Faced with a devastating prognosis, Terry raised millions, learned about science and biotech, and built a team to create a gene therapy – all in under 3 years.
At Sano, our mission is to accelerate precision medicine research through technology, making it easier for sponsors to run trials efficiently and effectively. Each quarter, we highlight the innovations that bring us closer to that goal. In this 2025 Q3 Product Spotlight, our Senior Product Manager walks through the latest updates designed to make research more efficient, scalable, and participant-centric.
Natural history studies are central to rare disease research. Rare diseases are defined as conditions that affect less than 1 in 200,000 people in the US or less than 1 in 2,000 people in Europe. With small patient populations that can be hard to reach, traditional clinical trial models are insufficient for rare disease drug development.
On the most recent episode of The Genetics Podcast, Patrick speaks with Samuli Ripatti, director of the Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland (FIMM) and professor of biometry at the University of Helsinki. His research has focused on using large biobanks, particularly FinnGen, to understand cardiovascular disease and other common conditions.