Current Events

WEBINAR REGISTRATION CLOSED

AGENDA

Friday, February 9, 2024

Speaker Biographies:

Professor Nathan Cortez
Co-Director of the Tsai Center for Law, Science and Innovation, an endowed Professor of Law in Leadership and Latino Studies at SMU Law School

Professor Nathan Cortez is the Co-Director of the Tsai Center for Law, Science and Innovation, an endowed Professor of Law in Leadership and Latino Studies at SMU Law School. He is one of the world’s leading legal scholars on medical device regulation, particularly devices that rely on artificial intelligence (A.I.) or machine learning.
 
Professor Cortez presents his research around the world, to governments, regulators, professional societies, industry, and fellow academics. He has presented work at the law schools of Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, among others, and at the medical schools of Harvard, Stanford, and Vanderbilt, among others.
 
Before joining the SMU faculty, Professor Cortez practiced with the Washington D.C. law firm Arnold & Porter, as part of its pharmaceutical, health care, and biotech practice. Professor Cortez holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania and a J.D. from Stanford.

Professor Barbara J. Evans
Professor of Law and Stephen C. O’Connell Chair at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and Professor of Engineering and Glenn and Deborah Renwick Faculty Fellow in AI and Ethics at the University of Florida Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering

Professor Barbara J. Evans is a Professor of Law and Stephen C. O’Connell Chair at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and Professor of Engineering and Glenn and Deborah Renwick Faculty Fellow in AI and Ethics at the University of Florida Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering. Professor Evans' areas of expertise include artificial intelligence/machine learning medical tools, data privacy and access to data, and FDA regulatory issues with medical software.

Professor Evans is currently legal lead for the NIH-funded Bridge2AI Collaborative Hospital Repository Uniting Standards (CHoRUS) project to develop an inclusive clinical data resource for use in advancing AI tools in critical care applications.  She serves as a Member of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine’s Standing Committee on Aerospace Medicine and the Medicine of Extreme Environments and recently served on an Expert Advisory Panel convened by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) to advise on Artificial Intelligence in Health Care.

Professor Evans holds an electrical engineering degree from the University of Texas at Austin; M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University; a J.D. from Yale Law School; an LL.M. in Health Law from the University of Houston Law Center, and she completed a post-doctoral Fellowship in Clinical Ethics at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center Professor. She is an elected member of the American Law Institute and is licensed to practice law in New York and Texas.

Professor Sara Gerke
Penn State Dickinson Law

Professor Gerke teaches at Penn State Dickinson Law. Her research focuses on the ethical and legal challenges of artificial intelligence and big data for health care and health law in the United States and Europe. Her research is funded by the European Union and the National Institutes of Health.  
 
Professor Gerke has over 60 publications in health law and bioethics, especially AI and digital health. Her work has appeared in leading law, medical, scientific, and bioethics journals, such as The George Washington Law Review and the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics.
 
Professor Gerke earned her law degree from the University of Augsburg with distinction-level results. She also holds a Master’s degree in Medical Ethics and Law from King’s College London.

Professor Wendy Epstein
DePaul College of Law

Wendy Netter Epstein is Professor of Law and Associate Dean of Research and Faculty Professional Development as well as the Co-Faculty Director of the Jaharis Health Law Institute​. Her teaching and research focuses on health care law and policy, with an emphasis on the financing and delivery of health care, the creative application of behavioral economic principles to entrenched problems, and matters of health equity. Her work has most recently appeared in the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, Southern California Law Review; Minnesota Law Review; Emory Law Journal; Washington Law Review; Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics; and Journal of Law & the Biosciences.​ She is also a frequent contributor to media, blogs, and op-eds, recently having published in The Hill, the Chicago Tribune, the Conversation, and U.S. News. She is a Public Voices Fellow of the OpEd project. Professor Epstein has received both the Faculty Scholarship and Faculty Teaching Awards.

Professor Epstein received her BA from the University of Illinois, and her JD from Harvard Law School, where she was editor in chief of the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (Recent Developments), executive editor of the Harvard Journal of Law & Gender, and co-authored an Internet privacy course for Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Prior to coming to DePaul, Professor Epstein clerked for the Hon. Michael Daly Hawkins, U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, and was a partner in commercial litigation at Kirkland & Ellis LLP. Professor Epstein has been a visiting professor at the University of Chicago Law School, University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law, and Loyola University Chicago School of Law.​

Professor Dr. Fazal Khan
Founder of Nexbridge Consulting

Dr. Fazal Khan is the Founder of Nexbridge Consulting, advising on legal, regulatory, and strategic business matters related to the integration of AI into healthcare. He is a nationally recognized expert on the regulation of emerging healthcare technologies—including AI, precision-medicine, and telehealth—with 17 years as a tenured professor at the University of Georgia School of Law. He has numerous scholarly publications and media interviews related to healthcare laws and regulations, including appearances on NPR and BBC. Both a medical doctor and a licensed attorney, Dr. Khan holds dual degrees in medicine and law from the Medical Scholars Program of the University of Illinois. He received his undergraduate degree in Biological Sciences at the University of Chicago where he performed bench research on protein receptors.  His two most recent articles on AI and healthcare regulations, “From Pixels to Prescriptions” and “Regulating the Revolution: A Legal Roadmap to Incorporating AI in Healthcare,” are available in pre-print form on his SSRN author’s page.