Translating complex biological data into real-world health solutions with innovative computational strategies

An expert in biomedical data science and artificial intelligence, Dr. Simpson develops innovative computational strategies to improve human health. She has authored over 90 peer-reviewed papers in high-impact journals such as Nature Communications, Cell, Cancer Research, and Computers in Medicine and Biology. Her research has been presented at leading national and international venues, including the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Dr. Simpson earned her BSc from Trent University (2000) and her PhD in Computer Science from Queen’s University (2010), followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Vanderbilt University in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Dr. Simpson was previously the Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Computing and Informatics at Queen’s University and an Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences and the School of Computing at Queen’s University as well as an Affiliate of the Vector Institute for AI and a Senior Investigator at the Canadian Cancer Trials Group. Before returning to Queen’s in 2019, she was an Assistant Attending Computational Biologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and an Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medical College.

Her contributions have been recognized with numerous awards, including the American Association for Cancer Research Career Development Award (2016) and the Mihran & Mary Basmajian Award for Excellence in Health Research (2020). Her research is supported by leading funding agencies such as the NIH, CIHR, NSERC, SSHRC, and CFI.

Beyond her research, Dr. Simpson is deeply engaged in the scientific community. She is a chartered member of an NIH study section, a Senior Editor at Cancer Research, and serves on the advisory boards of the Imaging Data Commons and the Digital Health Discovery Platform. She also led Kingston’s inclusion in the Terry Fox Marathon of Hope Cancer Centres Network and was the Founding Director of the Centre for Health Innovation, a partnership between Kingston Health Sciences Centre and Queen’s University. In these roles, she has spearheaded the expansion of research infrastructure—including a histopathology suite, biobank, and genomics facility—ensuring access to state-of-the-art resources for patient-centred research.