Duke Clinical Research Institute and AI Health are delighted to announce the return of Dr. Ricardo Henao to Duke, starting July 1! After a leave of absence at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia, Dr. Henao has returned to North Carolina as Associate Director of Clinical Trials AI for the Duke Clinical Research Institute (DCRI) and as a member of AI Health’s Faculty Council. Dr. Henao is Associate Professor in the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at Duke University School of Medicine.

“We are very excited about Dr. Henao’s return to Duke given his enormous contributions both to teaching and to developing novel methods for applying probabilistic modeling to deep learning algorithms,” notes Duke AI Health Director Michael Pencina, PhD. “Ricardo’s innovative work has been key to multidisciplinary efforts at Duke and beyond to improve predictive modeling for clinical outcomes,” he continues, noting that Henao’s gifts as a collaborator, methodologist, and teacher will be in high demand.

After obtaining his master’s in engineering from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Dr. Henao completed his doctorate at the Technical University of Denmark and conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Copenhagen. Arriving at Duke in 2011 as a postdoctoral associate, Dr. Henao would go on to receive a joint faculty appointment to the Duke School of Medicine and the Pratt School of Engineering. He has led multiple sessions of the popular Machine Learning Summer/Winter Schools, a short intensive course co-sponsored by Duke AI Health and Duke+Data Science that introduced students from all backgrounds to principles of artificial intelligence and machine learning.

In 2022, Dr. Henao was appointed associate professor in the School of Biostatics and Bioinformatics, and he served as Chief Scientist for Duke AI Health, Director of the Health Data Science program, and as a member of Duke’s Rhodes Information Initiative. Dr. Henao took an 18-month leave of absence to join KAUST as an Associate Professor of Bioengineering and as a member of the Smart Health Initiative (SHI) and the Computational Biosciences Research Center (CBRC) at KAUST. Upon his return in July, he will rejoin AI Health as a member of the Faculty Council and assume his new role as Associate Director of Clinical Trials AI at the Duke Clinical Research Institute.

“Ricardo brings a wealth of theoretical expertise and practical experience to the table,” says Duke Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Co-Chief Christopher Lindsell, PhD, who also serves as Director of Data Science and Biostatistics for the DCRI and the CTSI. “We’re very much looking forward to benefiting from his insights as Duke enters the AI age in health care and biomedical research.”

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Henao on his return to Duke!