{"id":5,"date":"2017-05-24T14:15:42","date_gmt":"2017-05-24T18:15:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/mobile-electronic-health-affinity-research-collaborative\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T10:36:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T14:36:50","slug":"mobile-electronic-health-affinity-research-collaborative","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/","title":{"rendered":"Mobile &#038; Electronic Health Affinity Research Collaborative"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img id=\"banner_img\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/files\/2017\/10\/ME-ARC-Final-Logo.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">Mission of the Mobile and Electronic Health-ARC (ME-ARC)<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span data-contrast=\"auto\">To conduct state of the art <\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">research and training <\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">in mobile and electronic health to improve health across the lifespan with an emphasis on underserved and vulnerable populations.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span data-contrast=\"auto\">To foster <\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">transdisciplinary<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\"> collaboration among researchers across BU who strive to improve health outcomes through digital research and scholarship<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span data-contrast=\"auto\">Unifying theme:\u00a0 Target hard to reach and underserved population with digital health interventions<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span>2025-26 theme:\u00a0 \u00a0To enhance our collective and individual expertise in AI for assessment\/monitoring and digital health behavior change<\/span><s data-ogsc=\"\"><span>\u00a0<\/span><\/s><span>interventions by applying AI and machine learning methods.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">Since January 2016, the ME-ARC has funded pilot projects, hosted monthly seminars, held networking events, provided mentorship in digital health and established a yearly ME-ARC symposium with national speakers and panels.\u00a0 <\/span><span data-contrast=\"none\">The ARC is transdisciplinary and has over 175 member affiliates across numerous schools at Boston University.\u202f<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Leadership team:<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">Founding Director &amp; PI:<\/span> <span data-contrast=\"auto\">Belinda Borrelli, PhD (GSDM); <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Co-Directors:<\/span>\u00a0Dan Fulford, PhD (SAR), Joanne Murabito, MD (MED)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">External core members:<\/span> Lisa Quintiliani, PhD (Tufts)<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;335559685&quot;:360}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Core members<\/span><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">:<\/span>\u00a0 Jordana Muroff, PhD (SW), Yannis Paschalidis, PhD (ENG), Greg Frasco (SAIL), Marva Foster, PhD, RN (VA), Nicole Spartano, PhD (MED), Jinying Chen, PhD (MED), Stephanie Shimada, PhD (SPH)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Previous core members<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">:<\/span> Swathi Kiran, PhD, CCC-SLP (SAR), Rebecca Mishuris, MD (MED), Julie Keysor, PhD, PT (SAR), Tibor Palfai, PhD (CAS), William Tomlinson, PhD (SAIL)<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #800000;\">Upcoming Monthly Seminars<\/span><\/h3>\n<hr \/>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/2026\/01\/07\/mobile-and-electronic-health-arc-seminar-march-2026\/\">3\/19\/26, 12-1pm: \u201cTherabot: 6.5 Years and Over 100,000 Human Hours Building and Evaluating the First Generative AI Psychotherapy Chatbot\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Presenter<\/strong>: Nicholas C. Jacobson, PhD\u200b &#8211; Professor of Biomedical Data Science, Psychiatry, and Computer Science, Dartmouth College &amp; Director, AIM HIGH Laboratory<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/2026\/02\/04\/mobile-and-electronic-health-arc-seminar-april-2026\/\">4\/7\/26, 12-1pm: &#8220;<span data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">Embodiment, Empathy, and Engagement in Automated Health Counseling&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Presenter<\/strong>: Timothy Bickmore, PhD\u200b &#8211; Professor in <span data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">Khoury College of Computer Sciences, Northeastern University<\/span><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/2026\/01\/06\/mobile-and-electronic-health-arc-seminar-february-2026\/\">5\/11\/26, 12-1pm: &#8220;Improving healthcare access, efficiency, and quality using Machine Learning and NLP&#8221;\u200b<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Presenter<\/strong>: John Piette, PhD\u200b &#8211; Professor of Global Public Health, University of Michigan<\/p>\n<p>*Rescheduled from February*<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><a href=\"\/me-arc\/files\/2025\/09\/PPTX-Fall-2025-ME-ARC-Seminar-Schedule-Flyer-1.pdf\"><\/a>Past seminars can be found on our <a href=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/events\/seminars\/\">monthly seminars page<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #800000;\">ME-ARC Symposium<\/span><\/h3>\n<p>The ME-ARC&#8217;s Lightning Talks Event entitled &#8220;Innovations in Digital Health Interventions&#8221; was held on <strong>Wednesday, November 20, 2024<\/strong>. For more information on past symposiums, please navigate to <a href=\"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/events\/symposiums\/\">our symposium page.<\/a><\/p>\n<p><span data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">The AI In Practice Symposium, presented by the Institute for Excellence in Teaching and Learning, was held on <strong>Tuesday, February 3, 2026. <\/strong>This symposium highlighted real-world examples of generative AI in research and education. <\/span>Dr. Belinda Borrelli presented on the AI work of the ME-ARC group in relation to creating a generative AI chatbot for health behavior change.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\" xml:lang=\"EN-US\" lang=\"EN-US\" class=\"TextRun SCXW45390260 BCX8\"><span class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW45390260 BCX8\">The<\/span><span class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW45390260 BCX8\"> ME-ARC is funded by the Evans Center Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research at Boston University<\/span><span class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW45390260 BCX8\">, Founding Director, Katya Ravid.<\/span><\/span><span class=\"EOP SCXW45390260 BCX8\" data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mission of the Mobile and Electronic Health-ARC (ME-ARC)\u00a0 To conduct state of the art research and training in mobile and electronic health to improve health across the lifespan with an emphasis on underserved and vulnerable populations. To foster transdisciplinary collaboration among researchers across BU who strive to improve health outcomes through digital research and scholarship\u00a0 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13479,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":3,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13479"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5"}],"version-history":[{"count":55,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1470,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5\/revisions\/1470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/me-arc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}