Spring 2026 ISL Brown Bag Lecture Series | Dr. Amir Rahmani

Описание: Title: Wearables, Agentic AI, and Living Labs: The Future of Health Innovation

Bio: Dr. Amir Rahmani is a Professor of Nursing and Computer Science at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), where he also holds the Samueli Endowed Chair of Integrative Health. He serves as the Co-Director of the UCI Institute for Future Health and leads the multidisciplinary HealthSciTech Group at UCI. His research spans mHealth, data science, wearable and mobile computing, machine learning and AI, affective computing, bio-signal processing, health informatics, and embedded computing. Dr. Rahmani's contributions have been recognized with the UCI Beall Applied Innovation’s inaugural Faculty Innovation Fellowship, the Nokia Foundation's Research Excellence Award, and the European Union’s Global Marie Curie Fellowship.

Abstract: Traditional controlled studies often fall short in capturing the complexity and diversity of real-world healthcare settings. In this talk, we explore how Living Labs—community-embedded, user-centered innovation environments—can bridge this gap by integrating research directly into everyday life. We highlight the role of advanced methodologies like SMART trial design and a suite of digital health platforms including Centralive, ZotCare, and Personicle. These tools enable personalized, data-driven interventions by leveraging mobile and wearable technologies, multimedia inputs, and real-time analytics.

Building on this foundation, we introduce openCHA, a new open platform for agentic conversational health agents powered by large language models (LLMs) and multimodal data fusion. Through real-world deployments—such as community-centered maternity care and stress-level monitoring among students—we demonstrate how AI can support dynamic, empathetic, and culturally aware health interventions. This talk outlines a vision for democratizing healthcare innovation through technology that is personalized, accessible, and grounded in real communities.