Biomedical AI: Its Roots, Evolution, and Agenda for the Future (XtraTrack Season 2026)

29-04-2026 16:00

Five decades have passed in the evolution of Artificial Intelligence in Medicine (AIM), a field that has evolved substantially while tracking the corresponding changes in computer science, hardware technology, communications, and biomedicine. Emerging from medical schools and computer science departments in its early years, the AIM field is now more visible and influential than ever before, paralleling the enthusiasm and accomplishments of AI and data science more generally. This talk will briefly summarize some of AIM history, focusing on clinical decision making and providing an update on the status of the field as we enter our second half-century. The inherent complexity of medicine and of clinical care necessitates that we address not only decision-making performance but also issues of usability, workflow, transparency, safety, evaluation, and ethics. These requirements contribute to an ongoing investigative agenda for AIM research and development.

Edward H. Shortliffe, MD, PhD, MACP, FACMI, FIAHSI, FAIMBE Chair Emeritus & Adjunct Professor of Biomedical Informatics - Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons Columbia University in the City of New York

Dr. Ted Shortliffe is Chair Emeritus of Biomedical Informatics at Columbia University and holds adjunct faculty appointments at both Columbia and Cornell. Editor Emeritus of the Journal of Biomedical Informatics (Elsevier), he is also an editor of two Springer textbooks: Biomedical Informatics: Computer Applications in Health Care and Biomedicine (5th edition, 2021) and Intelligent Systems in Medicine and Health: The Role of AI (2022). In the past Dr. Shortliffe served as President/CEO of AMIA and was founding Dean of the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Phoenix. A pioneer in artificial intelligence in medicine, including development of the well-known early medical expert systems called MYCIN and ONCOCIN, he has also led graduate degree programs in biomedical informatics at Stanford, Columbia, and Arizona State Universities. Both a PhD computer scientist and a physician, Dr. Shortliffe is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, a fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics and of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, and a Master of the American College of Physicians. He received the Association of Computing Machinery’s Grace Murray Hopper Award in 1976, ACMI’s Morris F. Collen Award in 2006, and IMIA’s François Grémy Award in 2021.

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