SDSC-Connect: Translating AI to Clinical Practice


Nora earned her Ph.D. in Computer Science/Bioinformatics from the University of Tübingen, where she focused on the in silico design of peptide-based vaccines using combinatorial optimization and machine learning. During her postdoctoral fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, and later as a staff scientist at the New York Genome Center, she worked on metagenomics, infectious diseases, and cancer. In 2015, Nora joined NEXUS Personalized Health Technologies at ETH Zurich where her focus shifted towards the management of clinical and biomedical research data. In May 2024, she joined the Swiss Data Science Center as Head of Biomedical Data Science.


Anna joined SDSC as a Data Scientist focusing on industry collaborations in July 2019. She completed her PhD in Bioinformatics at the University of Luxembourg, where she analysed large-scale heterogeneous datasets and leveraged multiple disciplines: Statistics, Network Analysis, and Machine Learning. Before joining SDSC, Anna worked as a Data Scientist at Deloitte Luxembourg, with a focus on computer vision and time-series analysis.Currently, Anna is a Principal Data Scientist based at the ETH Zurich office, where she leads biomedical collaborations with industry partners. Anna works on a range of projects: protein properties prediction, biomanufacturing optimization, statistical model evaluation and others.


Guillaume Obozinski graduated with a PhD in Statistics from UC Berkeley in 2009. He did his postdoc and held until 2012 a researcher position in the Willow and Sierra teams at INRIA and Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. He was then Research Faculty at Ecole des Ponts ParisTech until 2018. Guillaume has broad interests in statistics and machine learning and worked over time on sparse modeling, optimization for large scale learning, graphical models, relational learning and semantic embeddings, with applications in various domains from computational biology to computer vision.


Snežana joined the SDSC industry team in June 2021 on a mission to advance adoption of modern data driven solutions in the domain of public health care. She has a background in experimental particle physics with a Diploma from the ETH Zurich and a PhD from the University of Geneva. Snežana pursued fundamental research in the field of high energy physics at CERN for nine years, harnessing the power of machine learning and statistical methods to uncover the traces of new physics in petabytes of proton-proton collision data and to develop innovative particle identification algorithms. Since 2018, Snežana served as a Data Science consultant, supporting partners from industries such as manufacturing, insurances, compliance services and online platforms in creating business value from internal and external data.


Marisol has a degree in Law and more than 15 years of experience working as a notary officer in Madrid. After relocating to Switzerland with her family, she obtained a certification to teach Spanish as a foreign language, dedicating four years to teaching Spanish online to students of all ages and backgrounds. Marisol has returned to her professional roots as an administrative assistant, joining the SDSC team in June 2023.


Uta joined SDSC in May 2024 as Head of Communications & Events. Prior to that, she held various business communication management roles in technology-driven companies in material and life sciences, information and telecommunications as well as automotive industries. Her specialty is to transform complex messages into simple stories to help organizations reach key audiences with relevant and compelling contents, leveraging media and digital channels.Uta holds a Master of Arts from Humboldt University of Berlin, a Master of Business Administration from La Salle University, Philadelphia, and a graduate certificate in Sustainability Leadership from Cambridge University. In her free time she enjoys sports and traveling with her husband and two sons.

Presentation
SDSC-Connect: Translating AI to Clinical Practice
A Program of the Zurich AI Festival
Centered around the pivotal question, 'From Promise to Practice: What do clinicians need from AI?', this edition of SDSC-Connect brings together keynote speakers, thought leaders, and expert panelists to offer diverse insights into current challenges and emerging solutions, supported by focused presentations and real-world case studies. The program explores four critical areas at the intersection of AI and healthcare: Research, Validation, Practice and Trust.
Leveraging the collective expertise of leading voices in the health and biomedical domain, participants will gain deep insights and a distinctive learning experience that connects clinical needs with technological innovation, with the potential to connect with pioneers and peers and initiate conversations around collaboration.
Join the participants in pursuing key learning goals:
· Connect with leaders in clinical research, practice, and AI.
· Explore four essential focus areas: Research, Validation, Practice, and Trust.
· Build meaningful links across Switzerland, Europe, and the global clinical AI community.
Target audience:
Researchers, medical doctors, AI experts, data scientists, industry representatives (pharma, biotech) from the health and biomedical domain.
Confirmed speakers:
· Prof. Dr. med. Susanne Wegener, Senior Physician, Department of Neurology, University Hospital Zürich (USZ)
· Prof. Dr. Charlotte Bunne, Assistant Professor, Computer Science and Life Sciences Department, EPFL
· Prof. Dr. Michael Moor, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering, ETH Zürich
· Prof. Dr. Gunnar Rätsch, Head of Biomedical Informatics, Department of Computer Science, ETH Zürich
· Prof. Dr. Annie Hartley, Professor and Director, LiGHT (Laboratory for Intelligent Global Health and Humanitarian Response Technologies), EPFL
· Prof. Dr. Jean Louis Raisaro, Head of the Clinical Data Science Group at the Biomedical Data Science Center, Vaud University Hospital (CHUV)
· Dr. Snežana Nektarijevic, Senior Data Scientist, Swiss Data Science Center (SDSC)
· Dr. Sukalp Muzumdar, Head of GenAI Adoption, Scailyte
· Dr. Sabine Goldhahn, Lecturer at the Department of Health Sciences and Technology, ETH Zürich
· Dr. Jasmin Barman-Aksözen, Scientist and patient advocate for rare diseases, University of Zürich (UZH), ProRaris and International Porphyria Patient Network (IPPN)
· Dr. Alessandro Blasimme, Health Ethics and Policy Lab, Department of Health Sciences and Technology (D-HEST), ETH Zürich
Moderators:
· Dr. Nora Toussaint, Head of Biomedical Data Science, Swiss Data Science Center (SDSC)
· Prof. Dr. Guillaume Obozinski, Deputy Executive Director and Chief Data Scientist, Swiss Data Science Center (SDSC)
· Prof. Dr. Julia Vogt, Assistant Professor, Lead Biomedical Data Science Group, Department of Computer Science, ETH Zürich
· Dr. Anna Fournier, Principal Data Scientist, Swiss Data Science Center (SDSC)
Details
SDSC-Connect: Translating AI to Clinical Practice
Date & Time: Tuesday, 30 September 2025 | 09:30 - 18:00
Location: University Hospital Zurich (USZ), Large Lecture Hall EAST (Grosser Hörsaal OST), Schmelzbergstrasse 12, 8091 Zurich
Organized by the Swiss Data Science Center
Supported by ETH AI in Medicine Group | Zurich AI Festival


Zurich AI Festival is a flagship initiative by the ETH AI Center and Greater Zurich Area, co-created with the Amt für Wirtschaft, Kanton Zürich and Zürich Tourism, and leading partners from academia, industry, government, and the local AI ecosystem.
Programme
Agenda:
9:30 Arrivals | Welcome Coffee & Snack
10:00 Welcome Address
10:10 Keynote
· “From Promise to Practice: What do clinicians need from AI?” by Prof. Dr. med. Susanne Wegener, USZ
11:00 Session 1: Research
· Moderation: Prof. Dr. Guillaume Obozinski, SDSC
· "Virtual Cells and Digital Twins: AI in Personalized Oncology” by Prof. Dr. Charlotte Bunne, EPFL
· “Towards tool-using medical reasoning models” by Prof Dr. Michael Moor, ETH Zurich
12:00 Networking Lunch
13:00 Session 2: Validation
· "From Theory to Therapy: Advancing Critical Care with AI" by Prof. Dr. Gunnar Rätsch, ETH Zürich
· Expert talk by Prof. Dr. Annie Hartley, EPFL
14:00 Session 3: Practice
· Moderation: Dr. Anna Fournier, SDSC
· Case study: “Clinical AI journey - from raw data to bedside deployment” by Dr. Jean Louis Raisaro, CHUV, and Dr. Snežana Nektarijevic, SDSC
· Industry expert talk
15:00 Coffee Break
15:30 Session 4: Trust
· Moderation: Dr. Sabine Goldhahn, ETH Zürich
· Expert panel discussion with expert speakers incl. Dr. Jasmin Barman-Aksözen (Patient advocate, UZH), Dr. Jean Louis Raisaro (CHUV) and others
16:15 Wrap up
16:30 Networking Apéro
18:00 End of event
We look forward to welcoming you in Zurich!
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