AI and Technology

Rana Dajani plays a significant role in AI and technology through her contributions to the BioVault project as well as her work in bioinformatics and education. In the BioVault paper, she is involved as a scientific collaborator and advocate for ethical, privacy-preserving use of data, helping enable artificial intelligence and machine learning models to analyze sensitive genomic data without compromising ownership or privacy. She is also a member of Human Genome Project 2, where she supports global collaboration in genomic research. A key concept she promotes is data visitation, where algorithms are sent to the data instead of moving the data itself, ensuring stronger protection and sovereignty of sensitive information. Beyond this, she contributes to teaching bioinformatics, a field that combines biology, computing, and data analysis, preparing students and researchers to apply AI tools in biological and medical research. She has also been instrumental in spearheading bioinformatics networks in the Arab world, promoting collaboration, training, and capacity building across the region. Through these efforts, she helps ensure that underrepresented populations are included in global AI research while advancing responsible, inclusive, and ethically grounded technological development in healthcare.