Rama Shankar Singh

Professor Emeritus, Biology

0000-0002-5407-537X

Dr. Rama Singh is a world recognized researcher and Professor at McMaster University. Born and raised in a rural village in India, he obtained his undergraduate and master’s degree from India and landed in Canada in 1968. He obtained his PhD from University of California Davis, and after spending a year as postdoctoral fellow at the University of Chicago and two years at Harvard, Dr. Singh joined Department of Biology at McMaster University as Assistant Professor in 1975.

His area of expertise is evolutionary genetics and genomics, and his research has spanned from variation and evolution of sex and reproduction related genes to evolution of sexual dimorphism in diseases and mental disorders, and precision medicine. His recent work with women’s health including the evolution of menopause and maternal mortality has captured worldwide attention. He is past president of the Genetics Society of Canada (2010) and his research was recognized with a Fellowship by the American Association for Advancement of Science in 2005.

He has published over 175 papers including newspaper articles and opinion pieces that have appeared highly regarded journals, and newspapers. He has edited four books that were published by Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press. He is the founder of the Annual Mahatma Gandhi Peace Festival in the city of Hamilton in 1993, and he helped establish an Annual Mahatma Gandhi Lectures on Nonviolence at McMaster University in 1996. He is an active member of the local peace and human rights community and currently heads a Gandhi-King National Memorial taskforce. Dr. Singh public speaking engagement covers topic such as caste, class, race, sex and gender, and women's health.