2026 AIM-AHEAD Annual Meeting Brings Together Leaders Advancing the Future of AI in Biomedical Research and Healthcare

Networking and Collaboration Kick Off the Meeting

The Annual Meeting began Monday evening with registration, followed by a networking reception and AIM-AHEAD Coordinating Center poster presentations. The reception provided attendees with an opportunity to reconnect with colleagues, establish new collaborations, and learn more about the progress made across the Coordinating Center in research, training, and community engagement over the past year. Opening remarks from Jamboor Vishwanatha, PhD, Regents Professor and Vice President at UNT Health Fort Worth, welcomed attendees and set the stage for the week ahead.

Exploring the Future of AI in Healthcare

Tuesday officially opened with welcome remarks from Kirk Calhoun, PhD, President of UNT Health Fort Worth, followed by the keynote address, "The Future of AI in Healthcare: Technology is the Easy Part," presented by Thomas Osborne, PhD, Chief Medical Officer of Microsoft Federal. Dr. Osborne explored the evolving role of artificial intelligence in healthcare, emphasizing that while technology continues to advance rapidly, successfully implementing AI depends on people, trust, and thoughtful integration into clinical practice.

The morning continued with the panel discussion, "AIM-AHEAD and Next Generation AI," moderated by Gordon Gao, PhD, and featuring Xi Zhang, PhD, John Shepherd, PhD, Deepika Appana, PhD, Hadi Amiri, PhD, and Stephen Vieno, PhD. Panelists discussed agentic AI, foundation models, and other emerging intelligent systems that are shaping the future of healthcare research, while sharing perspectives on how academia, healthcare, and industry can work together to responsibly advance the next generation of AI.

The afternoon featured presentations by AIM-AHEAD awardees and fellows representing research programs across the Consortium, followed by Poster Lightning Presentation I, where selected presenters provided brief overviews of their research before the opening poster session. Attendees also participated in program-specific breakout sessions, providing opportunities to share program updates, discuss research progress, and strengthen collaborations.

During Poster Session I, AIM-AHEAD awardees and fellows from research programs across the Consortium showcased innovative projects and exchanged ideas with attendees. The day concluded with "The State of the Consortium: Reflecting on Five Years of AIM-AHEAD," presented by Jamboor Vishwanatha, PhD, AIM-AHEAD Primary Investigator, and Samson Gebreab, PhD, AIM-AHEAD Program Lead, Office of Data Science Strategy at the National Institutes of Health. This presentation highlighted the Consortium's accomplishments over the past five years and its continued vision for the future.

Building the Future AI/ML Workforce

Wednesday began with a featured presentation by Susan Fenton, PhD, Professor and Vice Dean for Education at the McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics at UTHealth Houston. Her presentation, "Governing Intelligence: Where AI in Healthcare Policy is Headed and Why It Matters," examined the evolving landscape of AI governance and the growing importance of thoughtful policy as artificial intelligence becomes increasingly integrated into healthcare.

Following Dr. Fenton's featured presentation, attendees participated in the panel discussion, "Building the Future AI/ML Workforce for Biomedical Research: Real-World Data, Cloud Infrastructure, and Responsible AI," moderated by Toufeeq Syed, PhD, MS. Panelists Linda Zangwill, PhD, Sally Baxter, PhD, Xiaoqian Jiang, PhD, Angela Gasdaska, MS, and Michael Kurilla, MD, PhD, discussed how national initiatives, including AIM-AHEAD, Bridge2AI, NCATS/N3C, and the All of Us Research Program, are helping prepare the next generation of the U.S. AI/ML biomedical workforce through collaboration, data resources, cloud infrastructure, and responsible AI practices.

Looking Ahead

As the 2026 AIM-AHEAD Annual Meeting came to a close, attendees departed with new collaborations, fresh ideas, and renewed momentum for advancing artificial intelligence in biomedical research and healthcare. The conversations, partnerships, and research shared throughout the week highlighted the strength of the AIM-AHEAD community and its commitment to accelerating innovation through collaboration.

Thank you to everyone who joined us in San Diego and helped make the 2026 AIM-AHEAD Annual Meeting a success. We are grateful to our speakers, attendees, awardees, fellows, trainees, mentors, program leaders, and partners for contributing to a week of meaningful discussions, knowledge sharing, and collaboration.