Abstract:
This workshop will be an informational and interactive opportunity for Smart and Connected Health (SCH) Aspiring Investigators to develop skills and address the knowledge gaps necessary to submit a successful SCH proposal. The goal of the SCH program is to accelerate the development and use of innovative approaches that would support the much needed transformation of health and healthcare. The mission of the Smart and Connected Health program is the development of next generation health and healthcare research through high-risk, high-reward advances in the understanding of applications in information science, computer science, behavior, cognition, sensors, robotics, bioimaging, and engineering. Realizing the promise of disruptive transformation in health and healthcare will require well-coordinated, multi-disciplinary approaches that draw from the computer and information sciences, engineering, medical, health and social behavioral sciences. The Aspiring Investigator workshop will support the development of researches interested in submitting research to the SCH program. The workshop will accomplish this through mentorship and didactic sessions to acquaint Aspiring investigators with the key issues associated with SCH, the joint NSF-NIH review process, and the breadth of existing projects funded by the SCH program.
Seminar Outline
- Introduction and Welcome — 15 min — Wendy Nilsen
- What is Smart and Connected Health — 30 min — NIH and NSF Program Staff
Discussion of the types of research supported through Smart and Connected Health, common challenges that PIs encounter with proposals to SCH, and tips for improving SCH proposals. - Mock review — 45 min — Program Staff and Current SCH PIs
Participants will observe a mock review of an SCH proposal. Current SCH grantees and experienced reviewers will serve as the mock panel. Aspiring PIs will gain valuable insight into what reviewers consider when making recommendations for the SCH program. - Small group mentoring — 75 min — Program Staff and Current SCH PIs
SCH grantees and program staff will mentor Aspiring PIs on developing research proposals appropriate for the SCH program.
List of Speakers (tentative)
Misha Pavel, Northeastern University, pavel@neu.edu
Title of Presentation: TBA
Bio: Professor Misha Pavel holds a joint faculty appointment in the College of Computer & Information Science and Bouvé College of Health Sciences. His background comprises electrical engineering, computer science and experimental psychology, and his research is focused on multiscale computational modeling of behaviors and their control, with applications ranging from elder care to augmentation of human performance. Professor Pavel is using these model-based approaches to develop algorithms transforming unobtrusive monitoring from smart homes and mobile devices to useful and actionable knowledge for diagnosis and intervention. Under the auspices of the Northeastern-based Consortium on Technology for Proactive Care, Professor Pavel and his colleagues are targeting technological innovations to support the development of economically feasible, proactive, distributed, and individual-centered healthcare. In addition, Professor Pavel is investigating approaches to inferring and augmenting human intelligence using computer games, EEG and transcranial electrical stimulation. Previously, Professor Pavel was the director of the Smart and Connected Health Program at the National Science Foundation, a program co-sponsored by the National Institutes of Health. Earlier, he served as the chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Oregon Health & Science University, a Technology Leader at AT&T Laboratories, a member of the technical staff at Bell Laboratories, and faculty member at Stanford University and New York University. He is a Senior Life Member of IEEE.
Paolo Bonato, Harvard University, pbonato@partners.org
Title of Presentation: TBD
Bio: Dr. Paolo Bonato serves as Director of the Motion Analysis Laboratory at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Boston MA. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Harvard Medical School, and an Adjunct Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the MGH Institute of Health Professions, Harvard Medical School. He has held Adjunct Faculty positions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Ireland Galway, and the University of Melbourne. At the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, he brings his experience in rehabilitation technology with special emphasis on wearable technology and robotics. Dr. Bonato serves as Member of the Advisory Board of the IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics and as Associate Editor of the IEEE Journal of Translational Engineering in Health and Medicine. He served as Founding Editor -in- Chief of the Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation. Dr. Bonato served as an Elected Member of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) AdCom (2007-2010) and currently serves as IEEE EMBS Vice-President for Publications (2013-present). He served as President of the International Society of Electrophysiology and Kinesiology (2008-2010). He also served as Chair of the 33rd Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (2011) and as Chair of the IEEE EMBS Technical Committee on Wearable Biomedical Sensors and Systems in 2008, a committee of which he was a founding member in 2006 and on which he served until 2012. He received the M.S. degree in electrical engineering from Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy in 1989 and the Ph.D. degree in biomedical engineering from Universita` di Roma “La Sapienza” in 1995.
Donna Spruijt-Metz, University of Southern California, dmetz@usc.edu
Title of Presentation: TBD
Bio: Dr. Donna Spruijt-Metz is Co-Director and founder of the mHealth Collaboratory at the USC Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research, and Research Professor of Psychology and Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California. She is Director, Responsible Conduct in Research for the Keck School of Medicine, and Associate Editor for Pediatric Obesity (formerly International Journal of Pediatric Obesity). Dr. Spruijt-Metz’s research focuses on childhood obesity. She currently leads several studies, including: 1) a longitudinal study of the impact of puberty on insulin dynamics, mood and physical activity in African American and Latina girls (Spruijt-Metz. PI), as part of the USC Center for Transdisciplinary Research on Energetics and Cancer; 2) an observational in-lab study on the acute effects of sugar-laden diets on behavior, mood, and hormone levels in overweight Hispanic and African American youth, as part of the USC Minority Health Research Center of Excellence, 3) the KNOWME Networks project (with Shri Narayanan), developing Wireless Body Area Networks specifically for minority youth for non-intrusive monitoring of metabolic health, vital signs such as heart rate, and physical activity and other obesity-related behaviors, and real-time interventions to treat and prevent obesity. She has used media-based interventions to reduce sedentary behavior in middle school minority females, and recently completed the Wellness Partners project with Marientina Gotsis, developing and testing a mobile, socially networked game to promote physical activity in adults and families. She is also involved in studies using mobile technologies such as ecological momentary assessment to understand obesity-related behavior in youth. She has a deep interest in harnessing mobile health and new media modalities to bring researchers and researched systems into interaction, to engage people in their own data, and to bring about lasting change in obesity through changes in societal norms, built and perceived environments, and behavior. Her work is funded by NIDDK, NIDA, NCHMD, RWJ and NCI.
Richard Conroy, NIH, conroyri@mail.nih.gov
Title of Presentation: TBD
Bio: Dr. Richard Conroy is the Director of the Division of Applied Science and Technology (DAST) at the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB). The focus of the division is to support the development of innovative biomedical imaging technologies that are low cost and accessible, transform our understanding of biological and disease processes, and enable patient centered healthcare. Richard also maintains a small portfolio of grants in hyperspectral and terahertz imaging, clinical informatics tools and comparative effectiveness research. Richard is also a coordinator for the NIH Common Fund program on Single Cell Analysis, the Bridging the Sciences program in collaboration with NSF and the Bioengineering Research Partnership program. Before joining NIBIB, Dr. Conroy was a researcher in the intramural program of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) developing multimodal imaging agents for tracking cells in vivo and methods for characterizing and manipulating individual biomolecules in vitro in collaboration with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). He has a background in physics, biophysics, biotechnology and international management.
Organizer I Wendy Nilsen
Bio: Dr. Wendy Nilsen is Program Director for the National Science Foundation’s Smart and Connected Health program. Her work focuses on the intersection of technology and health and includes convening meetings and training institutes in the areas of computational science and mobile technology related to health and she serves on numerous federal technology initiatives.
Organizer II Meghan Murphy
Bio: Dr. Meghan Murphy is an AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the National Science Foundation contributing to the Smart and Connected Health program. Meghan earned her PhD from University of California Davis in Biomedical Engineering. Meghan is interested in contributing to interdisciplinary training and research in the field of digital health.
