New Center Brings Technological Advances to the Future of Health Care

Amanda Randles
Amanda Randles, the director of the new Duke Center for Computational and Digital Health Innovation: “We’ve created an atmosphere where truly interdisciplinary work can be done to address the toughest health care challenges.” Photo by Bill Snead

A smartwatch that can flag early signs of disease. A virtual reality system that helps surgeons practice complex procedures before the first incision. AI-powered models that suggest personalized treatments.

This is what the future of health care will look like — and the new Duke Center for Computational and Digital Health Innovation will drive the research that makes it possible.

“We’re bringing together engineers, basic scientists, clinicians — all together to achieve our mission: to find, track, and treat human disease,” says Amanda Randles, director of the center and the Alfred Winborne Mordecai and Victoria Stover Mordecai Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the Pratt School of Engineering. “We aim to revolutionize health care by advancing the frontiers of technology.”

The center focuses on three technologies: wearable devices, high performance computing (HPC), and extended reality (such as virtual reality).

Collaboration Unique to Duke

Researchers across Duke use computational approaches to target problems in medicine. The center brings together faculty from the Pratt School of Engineering, Duke School of Medicine, Duke School of Nursing and Trinity School of Arts & Sciences.

 “Duke’s rich history of collaboration makes it the ideal place to bring engineering and medicine together to tackle the biggest problems in health care others simply cannot,” says Jerome Lynch, Vinik Dean of Engineering. “One of the advantages we have is the School of Engineering is literally across the street from the School of Medicine, rendering medicine-engineering interactions so intellectually vibrant and productive.”

The idea for the center came from a series of workshops with faculty from across all units of the university interested in computational and digital health. They had focused discussions about their needs, grand challenges that could be addressed and support needed.

“When the center was formed, it was an exciting moment for the medical community because it meant applying computational methods to all aspects of research,” says Manesh Patel, MD, chief of the Division of Cardiology in the Duke Department of Surgery, “making these methods accessible to everyone involved, including all the people we care for.”

Pioneering Change in Medicine

Members of the center are already making a difference through research. For example:

  • Maria Gorlatova creates augmented reality tools to help surgeons target areas within a patient’s body, showing the specific area within the surgeon’s field of view. Jessilyn Dunn and the Big Ideas Lab use wearables and computational tools to process masses of data into actionable health indicators, accessible in real time. 
  • Cameron McIntyre and the McIntyre Lab develop advanced visual software to better understand complex neurosurgical procedures through holographic visualization technology and head-mounted displays.
  • The Randles Lab is dedicated to advancing biomedical research through innovative computational methods, aiming to improve human health. They use supercomputers to uncover disease mechanisms and support surgical planning through immersive environments.

In addition to research, the center is dedicated to computational and digital health education. They hold regular in-person and virtual seminars and plan to have tech roundtables in the near future.

“We want people to understand how to use these new technologies,” Randles says. “If you’re a clinician, we want to help you know the nuances of how to deploy AI and the pros and cons of using the tools; engineers need to understand real-world scenarios and where the technology could be applied.” 

A certificate program has also been recently approved for Duke graduate students in Engineering, Arts & Sciences, or Medicine, with enrollment beginning this year.

“We’ve created an atmosphere where truly interdisciplinary work can be done and address the toughest health care challenges,” Randles says. “This is what the future of health care looks like.”

Research by Center Faculty