Healthcare CoP February 2019: Health Risk - Lifestyle Choices

We often hear that we live in a risk-filled world, where the food we eat, the lifestyle choices we make and even the cars we drive may endanger our personal health and safety, or even the health of the planet. But not all risks are created equal, and this talk will explain some of the ways we can better understand comparative risks. These often involve tradeoffs between the benefits we gain from our choices, versus any potential harms. I will illustrate these tradeoffs starting with examining the safety of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and compare any potential risks with those from overall diet and lifestyle choices, and some ideas on how our personal genetic background affects our personal risk levels.

Speaker: Richard Judson, Ph.D.

Richard Judson is Research scientist working at the intersection of chemistry, biology and computer science. Led teams developing databases, machine learning and data mining algorithms and other computer models in the areas of risk assessment, chemical safety, DNA diagnostics and drug discovery. Management and research experience in organizations ranging from biotech startups to large government labs.  Richard received his  Ph.D. from Princeton University and Bachelors from Rice University.