The 2025 World Medical Innovation Forum (WMIF) brought together leaders from across medicine, biotech, government, research, investors and other industries to discuss to discuss a wide range of topics at the cutting-edge of healthcare. If you missed it, not to worry – there's plenty of event news and highlights to catch up on.
On the last day of the three-day forum, 18 Mass General Brigham faculty innovators put themselves squarely on the hot seat (or lectern, more accurately) to participate in a friendly "First Look" competition.
These sessions were rapid-fire, eight-minute pitches to judges and audience members of medical and industry leaders, describing research projects that have significant potential to improve patient care and translate to industry.
You can watch the full playlist of First Look presentations here.
The pitches from the investigators touched on groundbreaking new treatment approaches and advances in cancer, autoimmune disease, women’s health, pediatrics, neuroscience and—not surprisingly, as it was a major theme that emerged throughout the conference—artificial intelligence (AI).
From the group, two winners were recognized by judges with “First Look” prizes for their work:
- Jeannie Lee, MD, PhD, the Phillip A. Sharp Chair in the Department of Molecular Biology at Mass General Brigham; for her work developing a new disease-modifying therapy for the rare genetic neurological disease in children, Rett syndrome (watch here).
- Michael Talkowski, PhD; Director of the Center for Genomic Medicine at Mass General Brigham; for his research on noninvasive, prenatal genetic screening through a simple blood test (watch here).
After the awards were handed out to conclude the 2025 World Medical Innovation Forum we asked two of the moderators of the First Look sessions – and renowned research leaders in their own rights – to discuss key takeaways and throughlines of these 18 innovative projects in a recorded podcast.
Robert Kingston, MD, chief academic officer and the former chair of the department of molecular biology at Massachusetts General Hospital, and Kathryn Rexrode, MD, MPH, chief academic officer at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, both left the sessions highly impressed and hopeful for the future. They chat about how the researchers leveraged advances in innovations like whole-genome sequencing and AI to propel their work, and weighed in on what to expect for the future.
Listen to Drs. Kingston and Rexrode in our podcast, and please also check out the individual First Look presentations to hear first-hand from these forward-thinking researchers about their science that has the potential for a transformative impact.
Leave a Comment