Organizing Committee
Linying Zhang, PhD, Lead Chair
Dr. Zhang’s research integrates causal modeling and machine learning to improve the reliability of evidence generation and building fair AI algorithms from electronic health records (EHRs). She completed her PhD in Biomedical Informatics at Columbia University, advised by Drs. George Hripcsak and David Blei. She also has a master’s degree in Computational Biology from Harvard School of Public Health and a bachelor’s degree from Boston University. Here is her CV.
Her recent research has focused on
- Addressing confounding bias and selection bias in real-world evidence generation
- Developing causal machine learning methods to explain causes of unfairness in healthcare systems
- Developing federated causal inference algorithm for real-world evidence generation.
Yves Lussier, MD, FAMIA, FACMI, Co-Chair
Dr. Lussier is a notable figure in biomedical informatics, currently serving as Professor and Chair of Biomedical Informatics at the University of Utah School of Medicine. With a background as an engineer and physician-scientist, he’s an authority in translational bioinformatics, known for his research on informatics techniques, ontologies, artificial intelligence of micro-cohorts, and personalized medicine. Previously, he held leadership roles and initiated informatics research and service groups at Columbia University, The NIAID Northeast Biodefense Center, The University of Illinois Health Sciences, The University of Chicago Cancer Center, and The University of Arizona Health Sciences.
As a leader in the fields of translational bioinformatics and of AI-augmented precision medicine, he has launched successful companies and international conferences, authored more than 200 publications, and delivered more than 100 invited presentations in precision medicine, systems medicine, and translational bioinformatics, including 28 opening keynotes at international conferences. He has been awarded $200M in grants as principal, core leader, or co-investigator, and mentored or co-mentored over 100 graduates, postgraduate fellows, and junior faculty members. Dr. Lussier’s honors include three IBM Faculty Awards, inducted Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (ACMI), 1st recipient of the Columbia University Faculty Mentoring Award, “Ambassador for Health Sciences” at the University of Sherbrooke (Canada), and 16 outstanding publication awards from the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA), the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB), and the Translational Bioinformatics Conference (TBC). In 2016, Dr. Lussier was invited among ten USA academic leaders invited by the White House for its Precision Medicine Summit.
Adam Wilcox, PhD, Co-Chair
Dr. Wilcox's expertise includes designing, developing, and maintaining medical data systems for observational research and clinical informatics. He has made significant contributions to the field of health information systems, emphasizing the sustainability of data systems through maturity models and advancing methods in health informatics.