Dr. Amber Simpson has been appointed as Director, Human Mobility Research Centre, Queen’s University & Kingston Health Sciences Centre.
On the recommendation of Deans Barbara Crow, Kevin Deluzio, and Jane Philpott, Mark Green, Provost and Vice-Principal (Academic) at Queen’s University and of David Pichora, CEO at Kingston Health Sciences Centre, Dr. Amber Simpson has been appointed Director of the Human Mobility Research Centre (HMRC). Her appointment is effective September 1, 2020, and is for a five-year term.
The HMRC is a partnership between Queen’s University and Kingston Health Sciences Centre that serves as a nexus of collaborative research endeavours spanning the disciplines of medicine, engineering, health sciences, and humanities. Located within the Kingston Health Sciences Centre, HMRC provides shared research space and services to clinicians, university faculty, trainees, and industry that uniquely positions it for innovation-driven research.
Dr. Simpson received her B.Sc. in Computing and Information Systems and Mathematics at Trent University in 2000. She earned her M.Sc. in 2002 and Ph.D. in 2010, both at Queen’s University. She has held appointments at Vanderbilt University, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and Weill Cornell Medical College.
Dr. Simpson joined Queen’s University in 2019 as a Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in Biomedical Computing and Informatics and Associate Professor, School of Computing and Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences, with a cross appointment to the Department of Medicine. She is a Senior Investigator, Canadian Cancer Trials Group, and Affiliate Member, Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence in Toronto.
Dr. Simpson brings extensive experience in collaborative research to her role. Working with cross-disciplinary teams, Dr. Simpson has contributed to more than 85 publications in machine learning, biomedical data science, and medical image analysis. She specializes in developing novel computational strategies for improving human health. She currently holds substantial grant funding from NSERC, SSHRC, CIHR, National Institutes of Health (NIH), and Canadian Foundation for Innovation for developing imaging and integrated computational modeling of multi-scale biomedical data. Her work has been recognized by the American Association of Cancer Research and Pancreatic Cancer Action Network. She was recently appointed by the Director of NIH as a chartered member of study section, reflecting both her high-quality academic work and commitment to biomedical research.
Deans Crow, Deluzio, and Philpott and Dr. Pichora are confident that the multi-disciplinary, collaborative teams at HMRC will greatly benefit from the expertise that Dr. Simpson brings to the role of Director. Please join the Deans and the CEO of Kingston Health Sciences Centre in congratulating Dr. Simpson on her appointment.
Note: This article originally appeared on the Queen’s Faculty of Health Sciences website.