Mount Sinai launches Center for Biomedical Blockchain Research
The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and the Institute for Next Generation Healthcare announced the official opening of the Center for Biomedical Blockchain Research. The venture will place Mount Sinai on the cutting edge of research that uses the technology, a distributed, decentralized secure database system originally developed for Bitcoin, to solve problems in healthcare and medical science.
The Center for Biomedical Blockchain Research is led by Joel Dudley, PhD, Executive Vice President of Precision Health at Mount Sinai, Mount Sinai Endowed Chair in Biomedical Data Science, Associate Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences, and Director of the Institute for Next Generation Healthcare, along with Noah Zimmerman, PhD, Assistant Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences and Director of the Health Data and Design Innovation Center.
Dr. Dudley’s research efforts focus on the application of data-driven approaches and machine intelligence to solve problems in biology and healthcare. The new center complements Dr. Dudley’s previous work developing predictive health applications from electronic health records, wearables, and related digital health information.
Dr. Zimmerman’s research involves designing data-driven technologies to improve decision-making in healthcare. Previously, Dr. Zimmerman was the co-founder of a venture backed health-tech startup and served as a data science lead at Pivotal Software, where he delivered predictive models for companies in healthcare and biotech.
The center’s research will lay the groundwork for its forthcoming industry partnership program for companies looking to develop biomedical blockchain solutions that address problems in both clinical medicine and biomedical research.
The center will work toward developing healthcare blockchain applications by:
- Conducting scholarly evaluations of blockchain-enabled solutions
- Providing partnership and consulting opportunities with companies working on these projects
- Building and testing its own systems within the Mount Sinai Health System
Numerous companies are already exploring the use of blockchain technologies in biology and healthcare. These applications include encouraging individual participation in drug development and clinical research trials, expanding access to health insurance products in underserved markets, improving quality control in the pharmaceutical industry to reduce counterfeit drugs, and enhancing research reproducibility.
