 for our first part of the program. I'm going to turn it over to our communications director, Sarah Bates, to present the first part. Thank you, Larry. Good morning, everyone. I have a little story to tell you. In December of this year, our NHGRI director, Eric Green, got an email from three students at Kilm Elementary, I'm sorry, middle school, saying that they were working on a project for something called National History Day. Does anybody here know what National History Day is? Yeah, we've got a few people who have done maybe some projects for National History Day. So these three eighth graders are named Shalyn Ball, Julian Amani Dove, and Dylan Patel. And they were doing research about the National, I'm sorry, about the Human Genome Project, which you might have heard of, of course. And for this project, they wanted to interview Dr. Green and also two other people, myself, and our acting deputy director, Vince Bonham, to ask questions about what's going on in the current state of genomic research, and also to ask some history questions about the Human Genome Project. And they wanted to know about the project because they said that it had sparked interest because the project has broken frontiers and genetics, as well as provided revolutionary new information regarding medicine and science. So you can see they're already excellent at science communication. Eric responded so fast to this email that he actually exceeded the speed of light. And it arrived back at these students before they had even sent their email. That's how excited he was. So days later, Eric, Vince, and I were talking with these students, and then we were kindly invited to see their exhibit for National History Day at it was Longreach High School in Maryland, where they won at the county level for their exhibit on the Human Genome Project. And yes, they will be competing at the state level on May 6th. So they are revamping their exhibit to fine tune it, maybe adding some things from today. So please, if you see them, any special tidbits you have about genome history, I'm sure they would love to hear it. And because of their enthusiasm for and curiosity about the history of science and for their work as ambassadors of genomics, we have invited them to join us here today to receive our first ever Ambassador of Genomics Award. So this award is being established by Eric Green and myself to recognize individuals who have helped to communicate the marvels of genomics in its importance to society, people who have shown themselves to be excellent ambassadors to genomics. So Shalyn, Julian, and Dylan are here with two of their parents, Svanda Bal and Shital Solanke. So please, Julian, Dylan, and Shalyn, please come up here and accept your awards. Thank you for your work. They will be here all day, so you know now what they look like and how to find them if you're online. I'm sure that you can send them your congratulations through the Zoom. And thank you again, and now I will turn it over to our NHGRI doctor, Eric Green, to introduce the first panel for our symposium.