UCD's Data Revolution in Health
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UCD is home to world leaders in predictive modelling, precision medicine, bioclinical informatics and new health technologies, generating real impact and breakthroughs in the clinical setting to make a real difference in patients' lives today.
Working with domestic and international collaborators, and clinical and industry partners, UCD experts are developing cutting-edge AI and data-driven approaches to provide solutions that are helping clinicians and society make better healthcare decisions.
Cracking cancer with code
UCD's leading experts in precision medicine and cancer research say Ireland should be harnessing the power of data and computing to revolutionise cancer treatment, and evolving the life sciences sector.
Read the op ed from Prof Walter Kolch and Prof William Gallagher, on how Ireland can capitalise on unique strengths that could make it a leader in computational medical and biological sciences.
How Ireland could envisage a richer and broader context for life science industry, enabled by research based on strategic partnerships that focuses across the value chain from early stage discovery to clinical application. Read the op ed.
Every line of data is a person
It's a startling statistic, that every 60 seconds a mother or baby dies as a result of the pregnancy complication known as preeclampsia. Prof Patricia Maguire and her team are working to save those lives through a revolutionary risk stratification tool called AI PREMie, a solution thatassists clinical decision making in real-time, enabling more accurate, earlier diagnosis and personalised treatment that will save lives.
The transdisciplinary team behind AI PREMie, drawsupon cutting-edge biomedical, clinical and machine-learning expertise including consultant haematologist and Full Clinical Professor Fionnuala Ní Áinle, UCD School of Medicine, and consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist Professor Mary Higgins from the National Maternity Hospital, in addition to
biomolecular and biomedical researchers from UCD Conway SPHERE research group and AI experts from UCD School of Computer Science - in partnership with Microsoft and SAS.
AI PREMie is currently being piloted in the three main maternity hospitals in Ireland, capturing 50% of all Irish births (National Maternity Hospital, Rotunda Hospital and Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital). The project was ranked by IRCAI-UNESCO among the Top 100 AI Solutions for Sustainable Development. (opens in a new window)Learn more.
Prof Patricia Maguire is also Director of UCD Discovery Institute and AI Healthcare Hub - a multidisciplinary, data-focused healthcare project accelerator within the institute - and is the leading academic on the Maternal Health strand of UCD's institutional research and innovation partnership with Northeastern University, Boston, US.
Read her interview, along with Prof Jared Auclair, Director of Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Vice Provost for Research Economic Development and Director of Bioinnovation at NU, and academic lead of the Biologics and Advanced Manufacturing strand.
"Combining the strengths of the multi-disciplinary AI PREMie and (opens in a new window)PROTECT (led by Northeastern University) teams we want to create new AI-powered solutions to transform maternal health across the globe. For example, it is vitally important to have sufficient high-quality training data to ensure that AI-based algorithms like AI PREMie, once in routine deployment in hospitals, will always make an accurate decision. Training AI PREMie on different patient populations across the world will maximise its performance enabling our team to deliver on our collective mission to get our new test to every patient who needs it across the world as we really do believe it will save lives," she said.
Leaders in predictive modelling and bioclinical informatics
The UCD Conway Institute of Biomolecular and Biomedical Research is strategically positioned as Ireland's foremost biomedical institute, driving transformative advancements in health and wellbeing through the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and computational science.
The Institute’s mission centres on the interdisciplinary exploration of health and disease mechanisms, focusing on the development of preventative strategies, novel diagnostics, and therapeutic solutions. This focus is systematically supported by the early institutional adoption of predictive modelling and pioneering 'omics' research, generating measurable impact and breakthroughs within clinical settings. Learn more .
UCD Clinical Research Centre: Vision for a data-driven future
UCD Clinical Research Centre (UCD CRC) has ambitious plans to transform the Irish healthcare landscape through data innovation. Under the direction of Prof Peter Doran, the centre is pioneering an innovative, data-centric strategy focused on building a secure, ethical, and scalable digital infrastructure to accelerate the development and deployment of novel AI solutions.
Under its strategy to 2030 launched this year, this initiative aims to provide a strong data foundation to drive the transformation of clinical practice, advance medical knowledge and enhance patient outcomes, establishing UCD CRC as a trusted partner.
SBI: The first Data Revolution
Established in 2009 under the direction of Professor Walter Kolch and Professor Boris Kholodenko, Systems Biology Ireland (SBI) has been leading the digital revolution at UCD.
Now, Professor Kolch and his teams are shepherding in next generation healthcare through groundbreaking projects under SBI, including the world's first Digital Twin Model in-clinic study, Ireland's first clinical study of genomics approaches in cancer care, MAGIC-I, and Ireland's leading and largest cancer research programme, Precision Oncology Ireland.
“SBI’s path is clear. We have proof-of-principle for our Digital Twin Models. One model is in a clinical trial in the US and we have a further clinical study in Ireland. We now really want to test drive Digital Twin Models in the clinic to show their value in enabling precision medicine," he says.
Ireland's first digital surgery unit
Led by Professor Ronan Cahill, UCD Full Professor of Surgery at Mater Misericordiae University Hospital and UCD School of Medicine, Ireland’s first Digital Surgery Unit was officially opened at the Mater in 2019. The unit conducts world-class research into future modes of human-machine collaboration in the surgical theatre.
By researching the integration of medicine with new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), and by including data analysts as part of surgical teams, this work aims to create new ways to support surgeons to make better decisions, thus promising better outcomes for patients.
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