Transitions in the age of biomedical AI
BIG DATA
small data
Your Data
FREIBURG | GERMANY
27.09. - 01.10.26
Keynote Speakers
Cathie Sudlow
Usher Institute and School for Population Health Sciences | University of Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
Cathie Sudlow is Professor of Neurology and Clinical Epidemiology, Director of the Usher Institute, Head of School for Population Health Sciences at the University of Edinburgh and Director of the UKRI Adolescent Health Study (AHS). Moreover, she is a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, the Royal Society of Edinburgh and Honorary Fellow of Health Data Research UK. She was awarded an OBE for services to medical research in 2020.
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Prof Sudlow’s research interests have always been firmly embedded in the world of big data. Over the last 15 years, her focus has been on leading large-scale, collaborative, open-science initiatives that enable a better understanding of the causes and consequences of health and disease across the life course, leading to new and improved approaches to prevention, diagnosis and treatment. From 2011 to 2019, as Chief Scientist for UK Biobank, she led efforts to follow the health of UK Biobank participants through linkage to national health datasets. From 2020, she worked with NHS Digital (and then NHS England) to develop NHS England’s first secure data environment to hold and enable access for research to linked health data from multiple sources for the whole population of England.
In 2023, Prof Sudlow was commissioned by the Chief Medical Officer for England, the UK National Statistician and NHS England to undertake an independent review of the UK-wide health data landscape. “Uniting the UK’s Health Data: A Huge Opportunity for Society” was published in November 2024 and sets out a bold vision for how the barriers and inefficiencies that currently delay the safe and secure use of health data to improve lives can be overcome, with key recommendations to transform the health data ecosystem.
Marylyn Ritchie
Institute for Biomedical Informatics | University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia PA, USA
Marylyn D. Ritchie is the Vice Dean of Artificial Intelligence and Computing at the University of Pennsylvania, Perelman School of Medicine. She is also the Edward Rose, MD and Elizabeth Kirk Rose, MD Professor of Genetics, Director of the Institute for Biomedical Informatics, Director of the Division of Informatics in DBEI, Co-Director of the Penn Medicine BioBank, and Vice President of Research Informatics in the University of Pennsylvania Health System.
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Dr. Ritchie is an expert in translational bioinformatics, with a focus on developing, applying and disseminating algorithms, methods and tools integrating electronic health records (EHR) with genomics. She has over 20 years of experience in translational bioinformatics and authored over 500 publications. Dr. Ritchie was appointed as a Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (ACMI) in 2020 and elected as a member of the National Academy of Medicine in 2021.
Moreover, Dr. Ritchie is dedicated to promoting the implementation of precision medicine into routine clinical care. Throughout her career, she has participated in research programs focused on the implementation of both pharmacogenomics and genomic medicine. Recent efforts are enriched in the concept of the Learning Health System, whereby they leverage the electronic health record linked biobank as a living laboratory to conduct research and then implement the findings to improve clinical care.
Andre Dekker
Maastro Clinic | Maastricht University Medical Centre+ | Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Andre Dekker is a Full Professor of Clinical Data Science and a board-certified Medical Physicist and is currently the Head of Clinical Data Science at Maastricht University, Maastricht UMC+ and Maastro Clinic. He also holds the position of Chief Scientific Officer at Medical Data Works. Dekker’s research centers on federated FAIR data infrastructures, AI for health outcome prediction models, and applying AI to enhance patient and citizen health. He has published over 150 peer-reviewed articles and patents and is co-author of the book Fundamentals of Clinical Data Science.
Annette Kopp-Schneider
Biostatistics, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) | Heidelberg, Germany
Annette Kopp-Schneider is head of the division of Biostatistics at the German Cancer Research Center. She holds a doctorate in mathematics and computer science from RWTH Aachen. Her research interests range from stochastic modeling of cellular processes and dose-response modeling to clinical statistics. Her involvement as biostatistician for the pediatric oncology trial series INFORM2 has started her interest in precision oncology and Bayesian clinical trial design. Her current focus is on the use of external information in clinical trials and the impact on trial operating characteristics. She served as president of the German Region of the International Biometric Society 2021-2022.