Igor Jurisica
Affiliated Professor of Computational Biology
Research Interests
Professor Jurisica's teaching and research interests span integrative informatics and computational biology, with an emphasis on the representation, analysis, and visualization of high-dimensional biomedical data. His work develops and applies advanced data mining, machine learning, and network-based methods to identify prognostic and predictive signatures, determine clinically relevant combination therapies, and model drug mechanisms of action and disease-altered signaling pathways.
Professor Jurisica is particularly interested in translating complex multi-omics and clinical data into actionable insights for precision medicine and public health. His research spans oncology, chronic diseases, and drug discovery, advancing AI-driven approaches that support robust, reproducible, and open science. Through both research and mentorship, he promotes interdisciplinary collaboration across computational, clinical, and life sciences to accelerate biomedical discovery and improve patient outcomes.
Email
In addition to his position at MBZUAI, Professor Jurisica is a Senior Scientist at the Schroeder Arthritis Institute and the Data Science Discovery Centre for Chronic Diseases at the Krembil Research Institute, University Health Network, and a Professor at the University of Toronto. Since 2021, he has served as Scientific Director of the World Community Grid, a global virtual supercomputing platform that enables large-scale open science research addressing humanitarian challenges. He has published extensively in leading journals including Science, Nature, Nature Medicine, Nature Methods, Journal of Clinical Oncology, and Journal of Clinical Investigation. He has also been recognized as a Highly Cited Researcher and listed among The World's Most Influential Scientific Minds, and his contributions to AI-driven healthcare have also earned him recognition among the Top 100 AI Leaders in Drug Discovery and Advanced Healthcare and Top 100 AI Leaders in Oncology.
- Ph.D. in Computer Science, University of Toronto, Canada
- M.Sc. in Computer Science, University of Toronto, Canada
- Diplôme d'Ingénieur (Dipl. Ing.) in Electrical Engineering, Slovak Technical University, Slovakia
- Doctor of Sciences (DrSc) in Medical Sciences, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Slovakia
- Tier I Canada Research Chair in Integrative Cancer Informatics, University of Toronto, 2011-2017
- Tier II Canada Research Chair in Integrative Cancer Computational Biology, University of Toronto, 2006-2011
- UHN Inventor of the Year, University Health Network, Toronto, 2008
- Thomson Reuters Highly Cited Researcher, 2014, 2015, 2016
- Thomson Reuters, The World's Most Influential Scientific Minds Report, 2014, 2015
- Top 100 AI Leaders in Drug Discovery and Advanced Healthcare, Deep Knowledge Analytics, 2019
- Top 100 AI Leaders in Oncology, Deep Knowledge Analytics, 2023
- Best Biology and Biochemistry Scientists List, 2022, 2023, 2024
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- US 2021/0215710 A1 (Methods For Use Of Cdx2 As A Biomarker To Guide Use Of Autophagy Inhibitors In Ovarian Cancer)
- US 0224313 A1 (Compositions and meth-ods for classifying lung cancer and prognosing lung cancer survival)
- US 8,211,643 B2 (Prognostic and predic-tive gene signature for non-small cell lung cancer and adjuvant chemotherapy)
- US 8,026,055 (A minimal set of prognostic marker genes for early stage Non-small cell lung cancer - Materials and Methods for Prognosing Lung Cancer - 3-gene classifier)
- US-8434085 (Scalable Scheduling of Tasks in Heterogeneous Systems)
- US 6,339,776 B2 (Dynamic semi-structured repository for mining software and software-related information), as well as Canadian Patent 2,284,949, US8,211,643, JP5583117, EP2288741 (DE), EP2288741 (FR), EP2288741 (UK), US8,026,055.
- Khan S, Chakraborty M, Wu F, Chen N, Wang T, Chan YT, Sayad A, Kotlyar M, Alibhai FJ, Woo M, Li RK, Husain M, Jurisica I, Gehring AJ, Ohashi PS, Furman D, Tsai S, Winer S, Winer DA. "B cells drive CD4 T cell immunosenescence and age-associated health decline." Science Immunology 11(115):eadv7615, 2026.
- Wu B, Lively SS, Vohra S, Fine N, Pastrello C, Maglaviceanu A, Espin-Garcia O, Pollock-Tahiri E, Nakamura S, Kaur P, Delos Santos K, Rockel JS, Potla P, Gupta H, Datta P, Tang L, Kwon J, Nakamura A, Buechler MB, Gandhi R, Wu J, Hinz B, Jurisica I, Kapoor M. "Identification of Ephrin type-B receptor 4 as a critical mediator of tissue fibrosis." JCI Insight, 10(24):e189156, 2025.
- Kotlyar M, Pastrello C, Abovsky M, Mizeranschi A, Keating A, Cameron LC, Chandran V, Jurisica I. "IID 2025: Physical protein interaction data with detection types, co-purified protein sets, molecular docking, and immune cell networks." Nucleic Acids Research 54(D1):D593-D600, 2026.
- Cente M, Perackova J, Peracek P, Majdan M, Toth I, Mikulic M, Hanes J, Spajdel M, Sivco P, Skrabanova M, Skrabana R, Jurisica I, Filipcik P. "Changes in peripheral blood and cognitive performance after nonconcussive head impacts in elite female soccer players. Communications Medicine (London) 5(1):417, 2025.
- Ganatra D, Kotlyar M, Dohey A, Codner D, Li Q, Abji F, Rasti M, Eder L, Gladman D, Rahman P, Jurisica I, Chandran V. "Combining Clinical, Genetic and Protein Markers Using Machine Learning Models Discriminates Psoriatic Arthritis Patients From Those With Psoriasis." Journal of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis, 24755303251344134. doi: 10.1177/24755303251344134, 2025.
- Yuan Z, Ostrowska-Podhorodecka Z, Cox T, Norouzi M, Wang Y, Robaszkiewicz K, Siatkowska M, Xia K, Ali A, Abovsky M, Jurisica I, Smith P, McCulloch CA. "Annexin A2 Contributes to Release of Extracellular Vimentin in Response to Inflammation." FASEB Journal, 39(9):e70621, 2025.
- Liao Z, Kumar K, Kopal J, Huguet G, Saci Z, Jean-Louis M, Pausova Z, Jurisica I, Bearden CE; IMAGEN Consortium; 16p11.2 European Consortium; Jacquemont S, Paus T. "Copy number variants and the tangential expansion of the cerebral cortex." Nature Communications, 16(1):1697, 2025.
- Rockel JS, Sharma D, Espin-Garcia O, Hueniken K, Sandhu A, Pastrello C, Sundararajan K, Potla P, Fine N, Lively SS, Perry K, Mahomed NN, Syed K, Jurisica I, Perruccio AV, Rampersaud YR, Gandhi R, Kapoor M. "Deep learning-based clustering for endotyping and post-arthroplasty response classification using knee osteoarthritis multiomic data." Archive of Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, S0003-4967(25)00057-3, 2025.
- Samarasinghe KW, Kotlyar M, Vallet SD, Hayes C, Naba A, Jurisica I, Lisacek F, Ricard-Blum S. "MatrixDB 2024: an increased coverage of extracellular matrix interactions, a new Network Explorer and a new web interface." Nucleic Acids Research 53(D1):D1677-D1682, 2025.
- Coelho NM, Riahi P, Wang Y, Ali A, Norouzi M, Kotlyar M, Jurisica I, McCulloch CA. "The major vault protein integrates adhesion-driven signals to regulate collagen remodeling." Cell Signal. 124:111447, 2024.
- Jurisica I. "Explainable biology for improved therapies in precision medicine: AI is not enough." Best Practice & Research: Clinical Rheumatology, 38(4):102006, 2024.
- Boshart A, Petrovic S, Abovsky M, Pastrello C, Farkona S, Manion K, Neupane S, Allen M, Jurisica I and Konvalinka A. "Molecular landscape of kidney allograft tissues data integration portal (NephroDIP): A curated database to improve integration of high-throughput kidney transplant datasets." Frontiers in Immunology 15:1469500, 2024.
- Nakamura A, Jo S, Nakamura S, Aparnathi MK, Boroojeni SF, Korshko M, Park YS, Gupta H, Vijayan S, Rockel JS, Kapoor M, Jurisica I, Kim TH, Haroon N. "HIF-1? and MIF enhance neutrophil-driven type 3 immunity and chondrogenesis in a murine spondyloarthritis model." Cellular and Molecular Immunology. 21(7):770-786, 2024