i joined NYU as an assistant professor nearly ten years ago in Fall 2015. during that fall, Glen de Vries, who was the founder and president of Medidata, endowed a professorship in health statistics at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, NYU. this was celebrated in an event in the faculty lounge on the 13th floor of the Warren Weaver Hall. because i had a weekly lab session for my very first course at NYU almost at the same time, i sadly could not attend it myself, but it was how i learned of Glen de Vries, Medidata and their pioneering (and continuing) work on software and data for clinical trials and more broadly healthcare. this was one of those few moments in the early stage of career that tilted me toward machine learning and data science for healthcare and medicine.
on March 1 2017, Glen visited NYU Center for Data Science with a delegation from Medidata, to hear about our research and discuss potential collaboration as well as the potential of data science for healthcare. again, there was an overlap with my lecture and their visit, but this time i was not going to miss the opportunity to meet Glen as well as others, including David Lee from Medidata to hear about what kind of data science problems they encounter and want to tackle, with us. my lecture was at 9.30am, and their visit was from 9 until 11 or so. i was able to attend the meeting at 9am, told them about our research on deep learning at NYU to Glen and others and ran to the lecture hall. it was sadly too short, but it was a moment i wouldn’t have missed.
i never got to meet Glen in person again until late early fall of 2021. by then, Glen was not just a celebrity health and medical technology entrepreneur but became a celebrity beyond health and medical technology after his suborbital flight to outer space on Blue Origin with William Shatner. one day in fall 2021, i saw him at the gym where i recently started to go to. i immediately recognized him from my own memory as well as his pictures i’d seen on newspapers. i should’ve approached him and said hi, but as anyone who lives in New York knows, we don’t do that here; even when you accidentally run into a celebrity of your childhood dream, you don’t say hi but stay calm and pretend you did not see them. because we are cool, i guess. so, i didn’t say hi but just thought to myself that “i actually know this guy who founded medidate and also went into outerspace. i’m cool.”
i didn’t know until a month or so afterward that i would regret this moment (or a couple of them, as a matter of fact.) Glen died in november that year (2021) after the plane crash in NJ.
now in 2025, a few days ago i received news from the Chair of the Department of Computer Science, the Director of the Center for Data Science as well as the President of the university that i was appointed as the Glen de Vries Professor in Health Statistics. yes, that professorship created 10 years ago based on generously endowment by Glen at the Warren Weaver Hall.
since that moment in 2015 when late Glen de Vries endowed a professorship at the Courant Institute, my career has revolved around healthcare and medicine, regardless of whether i intended or not. with this appointment and with a great honour, i will continue to push forward in developing, improving and innovating artificial intelligence for healthcare and medicine to benefit everyone.
Epilogue
while trying to look up some press coverage of Glen de Vries’ endowment of the professorship in health statistics, i found the Fall 2015 issue of “Courant Newsletter”. browsing through this issue, i noticed two things. first, there was a nice, albeit short, coverage of Glen’s generous endowment with his philosophy behind data science for personalized medicine and healthcare. and two, i was listed as one of the new faculty members at the Courant Institute.
(right) “Welcome to our newest faculty” from the same issue.
perhaps i’ve always been destined to work on data science for healthcare and medicine ever since Fall 2015.