People

Michael Ripperger, Application Developer

Michael received a BE in Biomedical Engineering from Vanderbilt University and, during this time, worked as an undergraduate research assistant in the Walsh Lab for two years through the SyBBURE Searle Program. He was previously a Fleming Scholar at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation. He is now an application developer in the lab and specializes in developing and evaluating machine learning algorithms.

Katey Robinson, Project Manager

Katey is a Tennessee native and graduated from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Prior to joining the lab, she spent several years as a medical scribe and traveling project manager. In this role she developed, implemented, and managed inpatient, ambulatory, and emergency department scribe programs for healthcare groups across the country. This included the implementation of a scribe program for VUMC’s Department of Urologic Surgery during Vanderbilt’s 2017 EHR transition from StarPanel to eStar. 

In the lab, Katey provides project management support across Dr. Walsh’s research portfolio and facilitates day to day lab administration. She has also served as a chart validator for numerous projects investigating natural language processing (NLP) for phenotypic extraction.

Drew Wilimitis, Statistical Analyst

Drew is from Chicago, IL, and he received a Bachelor of Science in Computational and Applied Mathematics from the University of Chicago. He has a background in data science and applied machine learning, with particular interests in network science and topological data analysis. He aspires to apply mathematical methods in order to study psychology and behavioral health from first principles. In his free time, he enjoys reading philosophy, watching teen dramas on Netflix, and listening to obscure comedy podcasts.

Jhansi Kolli, Research Analyst

Jhansi is a part of the local Murfreesboro community in Tennessee. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from Bates College located in Lewiston, Maine. She first became interested in suicide prevention and studying rates of suicidal ideation during her work as a level three counselor with Crisis Text Line. 

Alex Becker

Alex is an Ohio native and received a degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Cincinnati. Prior to joining the Walsh Lab, he worked as a student researcher at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and Medical Center. His research interests include applied predictive modeling for suicidality and machine learning. In his free time, he enjoys camping, hiking, kayaking, and photography.

Ioana Danciu

Ioana is a second decade PhD student in the Walsh Lab. Her research focuses on predictive deep learning models using multi-modal data.

Barrett Jones

Barrett is a PhD student from Salt Lake City, Utah. He has a master’s degree in Statistics from Columbia University and prior to moving to Nashville worked as a data analyst at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. He is interested in applying machine learning to better understand depression treatment trajectories. In his free time he enjoys golfing, biking and skiing.

KJ Krause

KJ is a PhD student from Redding, California. He received a degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of California Davis. Prior to joining VUMC, he worked as a Quality Control analyst at Genentech and as a research assistant at UC Davis. His research interests include applied predictive modeling, machine learning, and precision medicine. Some of his hobbies include snowboarding, cycling, and cooking.

Hannah Slater 

Hannah is currently pursuing a MS and PhD in biomedical informatics at Vanderbilt University. She has a dual Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering and Chemistry from the University of Alabama. Her current research interests are characterization, identification, and prevention of suicide and adverse events.