Harold Garner

Harold Ray Garner ("Skip Garner") is a biophysicist with distinguished research careers both in plasma physics, in bioengineering and bioinformatics. Dr. Garner was born in St. Louis, Mo. on 5 February 1954. He received his BS in Nuclear Engineering (minor in computer science) at the University of Missouri, Rolla in 1976 and a Ph.D. in plasma/high temperature matter physics from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1982. He also holds an honorary professional engineering degree also from the University of Missouri, Rolla.

From 1982 to 1994, Dr. Garner was a scientist at General Atomics in San Diego where he conducted experimental and theoretical research for the Department of Energy at international fusion research facilities. In the last 6 years at GA, he was a founding member of “The Institute”, an internal think tank, where he developed artificial intelligence/expert systems, new particle accelerators, high temperature superconductors, stealth/defense technologies and biology software and instrumentation.

From 1994 to 2009, Dr. Garner held the P. O’B. Montgomery, M.D., Distinguished Chair, and was a Professor of Biochemistry and Internal Medicine, a member of the McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development (Human Genetics Center).

In December, 2009, Dr. Garner moved to Virginia Tech and became the Executive Director of the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and a Professor of Biological Science, Computer Science and Medicine.

In 2012, Garner was demoted from Executive Director following an audit into his hiring and firing practices. Garner then sued the university in 2014, claiming that the university violated his Constitutional 14th amendment due process rights, his employment contract and it caused damage to his reputation. In the 2015 settlement, he was appointed Executive Director of the newly created Office of Medical Informatics Translation, Training and Ethics (MITTE) for 4 years without limits on outside employment

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