Q&A with Fred Hutch’s new main info officer on creating a details ecosystem at an institutional scale

Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Analysis Centre has recruited a new vice president and chief info officer: biostatistician and details science educator Jeffrey Leek. Leek will begin in the newly formed situation by July 1, the Hutch announced Tuesday.

Leek will be leaving his present-day put up as a professor of biostatistics and oncology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Community Well being and co-director of its Details Science Lab.

He develops tools to assist understand enormous-scale genomic and biomedical data and has helped deliver on line studying packages that have enrolled much more than 8 million folks. He also directs Information Trail, which trains and supports underserved communities for function in facts science, and in 2020 co-launched information management startup Streamline Facts Science.

Leek will get there at the Hutch as the establishment functions out a new proposed partnership framework with UW Medication, Seattle Children’s and the Seattle Cancer Treatment Alliance, and he will condition an built-in data company.

His transfer is in some methods a homecoming — the Idaho indigenous attained his Ph.D. at the University of Washington and has held associations with regional scientists. He also will join the Fred Hutch faculty as professor in the community wellness sciences division.

We spoke with Leek about his strategies at Fred Hutch, how he sees the institution integrating into the tech and entrepreneurship local community, and his designs to expand details science schooling. The subsequent job interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

GeekWire: Congrats on the new gig, Jeffrey. What are you most energized about?

Jeffrey Leek: I am psyched about the opportunity of creating a info ecosystem at an institutional scale. I’ve been major the Johns Hopkins Details Science Lab right here for the final couple years, and we do a great deal of infrastructure advancement and info administration training, significant on line open courses on Coursera. This opportunity is to just take that imagining and scale it to the amount of an establishment and determine out a way to aid every person at the Hutch to use information in means that are extra effective, simpler and entertaining. The scientists there are full world class, and it is enjoyment to consider the new collaborations that we’re going to build. Staying a aspect of the larger Seattle info and tech ecosystem is also just incredibly powerful.

GeekWire: What goes into generating a info ecosystem?

Leek: It is about location up the right systems, building it quick to use information, making in the appropriate ethical and privateness worries, and then teaching persons to do use details in approaches that perhaps they have not been capable to just before. And so, all of that collectively results in an natural environment the place you can accelerate a whole bunch of various varieties of research, from cancer analysis to infectious illnesses to all the things across the board.

GeekWire: What are the alternatives in bringing collectively information across Seattle-location analysis establishments?

Leek: The facts that is staying collected about all of the distinct therapies and protocols at these establishments can be introduced collectively in a way that makes it possible for us to do large scale analyses, to identify which therapies get the job done in just which sub-populations and establish hypotheses for following up with foreseeable future research. The authentic excitement around it is becoming ready to leverage information from all those institutions to response some of the issues that are seriously tough to answer at the one establishment scale. When you have a uncommon party or aspect result, it is more challenging to see that.

GeekWire: How do you see Fred Hutch integrating into the more substantial tech and entrepreneurship neighborhood?

Leek: The Hutch is really contemplating through exactly where the points are for a mutually advantageous romantic relationship in between the establishment and non-public companions — whether or not which is investors to assistance support spinning out suggestions focused on details science, or conversing to opportunity associates about growing the measurement and scope of the analyses that we can do. You want to be very mindful to retain the belief of the nonprofit business, while at the exact time locating methods to get the ideal of the personal infrastructure to carry to bear on collaborating to create greater options for patients. It’s a tricky detail to navigate.

GeekWire: How do you see the Hutch operating with bigger gamers like Amazon and Microsoft, vs. scaled-down startups?

Leek: There are distinctions and possibilities there for confident. With the much larger companies, my knowledge has been, and what I’m wanting ahead to executing, is starting off with modest points of get hold of. So, you obtain a single researcher who has a single seriously critical want, this sort of as scaling a dashboard with infectious condition data to a huge local community, or possibly you have a massive-scale tech companion that presently has present technologies. And then as soon as you’ve had that 1st marriage created, then you can kind of scale out from there to discover other spots you can grow. I observed that the detail that really like lights a fire is figuring out individuals who are psyched about a widespread difficulty and having them to operate collectively and create a option for it. And then pouring the institutional guidance powering it can really explode amazing suggestions out into the community.

GeekWire: Can you grow on the Hutch’s position in partnering with or fostering startups?

Leek: There is every little thing from licensing technologies to identifying means to assist trainees who see on their own expanding into a a lot more startup-like group relatively than heading into academics. How do we create that assistance infrastructure, so folks with that type of enthusiasm can be capable to do it? It is all about setting up interactions concerning individuals who want to resolve related troubles. I think there’s a good deal of place for creative imagination, particularly inside of the knowledge, equipment finding out and AI place at the interface between biotechnology and knowledge science.

GeekWire: Notify us additional about your outreach initiatives with Data Trail and how you experience that will in shape into your get the job done in Seattle.

Leek: People who acquire enormous on line open classes are already perfectly educated, like master’s degree people seeking to modify occupations. And so we started to conceive how could we establish a method that would bring men and women from the group into the info company at Hopkins. We designed a schooling system built for essential details science and data administration and we partnered with local community-primarily based nonprofits to recognize proficient math and science learners in our community. We put them by means of a tutoring system the place we would shell out them to finish the programs, furnished them with laptops, and worked with nonprofit partners to offer social and money guidance. We worked with Johns Hopkins so that they could arrive in as entry level facts science and info administrators, and developed this pathway into the Johns Hopkins ecosystem. I’m seriously energized to have Info Trail in Seattle get started to improve. We’re hoping to operate it in other areas around the country as properly.

GeekWire: Last ideas?

Leek: One of the items I’d really really like to do in terms of the tech ecosystem is to get started making connections to folks who are passionate about most cancers analysis and open supply data science teaching, any of the factors I’ve talked about in the ecosystem. I hope to be an energetic participant in that system and the persons there. I’m hoping that folks on that facet will reach out to me if they’re excited about doing the job with us, and I system on achieving out in the other course, too.