I am a tenured Full Professor in the School of Information (iSchool) and Director of the Institute for Successful Longevity at Florida State University. My research lies at the intersection of biomedical and health informatics and information science, with core expertise in machine learning, natural language processing, knowledge representation, and human-centered AI. I am also Co-Director of the Biostatistics, Informatics, and Research Design Program (BIRD) for the UF-FSU Clinical and Translational Science Award. I currently serve as Chair of the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining Working Group. I am an elected fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (ACMI), International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics (IAHSI), and the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA). I'm honored to receive the 2022 Lois Lunin Award from the Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T) and the 2026 Outstanding Graduate Faculty Award from Florida State University.
At Florida State University, I direct the eHealth Lab, where my research focuses on developing and evaluating trustworthy, human-centered artificial intelligence (AI) and informatics technologies to improve healthcare delivery, patient engagement, and health outcomes. My work emphasizes empowering patients, caregivers, and clinicians through AI-driven health communication, personalized decision support, and accessible digital health technologies, with particular attention to older adults and underserved populations. My research is highly interdisciplinary, bringing together collaborators from biomedical informatics, computer science, medicine, psychology, public health, gerontology, and industry to translate innovative AI methods into practical solutions for healthcare and community settings. I have led multidisciplinary research teams and maintained continuous federal research funding as a Principal Investigator since 2019, with major awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). As a Principal Investigator or Co-Investigator, I have contributed to research projects supported by more than $30 million in grant awards, alongside additional funding and research support from foundations, industry, and institutional partners. Across my research program, I strive to bridge advances in AI and data science with real-world healthcare needs, developing technologies that are scientifically rigorous, clinically relevant, equitable, and accessible to diverse populations.
I received my B.S. in Computer Science from Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications in 2007, M.S. from Columbia University in 2009, and Ph.D. from New Jersey Institute of Technology in 2014. Following my doctoral training in biomedical informatics, I completed my postdoctoral research at Columbia University's Department of Biomedical Informatics before joining Florida State University. I was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2020 and Full Professor in 2025. During my 2023–2024 sabbatical, I served as a Guest Researcher at the National Library of Medicine, exploring applications of large language models in healthcare.
I have authored over 150 peer-reviewed publications in leading journals and conferences, including Nature Communications, npj Digital Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association (JAMIA), Journal of Biomedical Informatics (JBI), Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR), and the AMIA Annual Symposium. My research has received multiple prestigious recognitions, including two AMIA Distinguished Paper Awards (2015 and 2017), an AMIA Best Student Paper Award (2019), and selections for AMIA Informatics Year in Review.
I actively contribute to the biomedical informatics research community through editorial leadership, peer review, and research funding evaluation. I serve on the editorial boards of several leading journals, including the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association (JAMIA) and Journal of Biomedical Informatics (JBI), and as an Associate Editor for Smart Health and the Journal of Healthcare Informatics Research. I regularly review manuscripts for leading journals in medicine, biomedical informatics, and artificial intelligence. I also serve as a grant reviewer for major national and international funding agencies, including NIH, AHRQ, NSF, and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. I am currently a standing member of the NIH Clinical Informatics and Digital Health (CIDH) Study Section.
