Nils Gehlenborg

Nils Gehlenborg, PhD

Associate Professor of Biomedical Informatics
Director, Master of Biomedical Informatics (MBI) Program

10 Shattuck Street, Boston, MA 02115

Nils Gehlenborg  received his PhD from the University of Cambridge and was a predoctoral fellow at the European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI).

The goal of Gehlenborg’s research is to improve human health by developing computational techniques and interfaces that enable scientists and clinicians to efficiently interact with biomedical data. Tight integration of algorithmic approaches from biomedical informatics with advanced data visualization techniques is central to his efforts, as is close collaboration with clinicians and experimentalists. Currently, Gehlenborg is researching and developing novel tools to visualize heterogeneous data from large-scale cancer genomics studies such as The Cancer Genome Atlas, integrating visual and computational approaches to support sense-making in biology, and using software to support reproducible collaborative research in epigenomics and genomics.

Gehlenborg is a co-founder and former general chair of BioVis, the Symposium on Biological Data Visualization, and co-founder of VIZBI, the annual workshop on Visualizing Biological Data. Occasionally, he contributes to the “Points of View” data visualization column in Nature Methods.

Gehlenborg currently serves as the Director of the Master of Biomedical Informatics (MBI) program at Harvard Medical School.


DBMI Research Areas
DBMI Courses
International Analysis of Electronic Health Records of Children and Youth Hospitalized With COVID-19 Infection in 6 Countries.
Authors: Bourgeois FT, Gutiérrez-Sacristán A, Keller MS, Liu M, Hong C, Bonzel CL, Tan ALM, Aronow BJ, Boeker M, Booth J, Cruz Rojo J, Devkota B, García Barrio N, Gehlenborg N, Geva A, Hanauer DA, Hutch MR, Issitt RW, Klann JG, Luo Y, Mandl KD, Mao C, Moal B, Moshal KL, Murphy SN, Neuraz A, Ngiam KY, Omenn GS, Patel LP, Jiménez MP, Sebire NJ, Balazote PS, Serret-Larmande A, South AM, Spiridou A, Taylor DM, Tippmann P, Visweswaran S, Weber GM, Kohane IS, Cai T, Avillach P.
JAMA Netw Open
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What Every Reader Should Know About Studies Using Electronic Health Record Data but May be Afraid to Ask.
Authors: Kohane IS, Aronow BJ, Avillach P, Beaulieu-Jones BK, Bellazzi R, Bradford RL, Brat GA, Cannataro M, Cimino JJ, García-Barrio N, Gehlenborg N, Ghassemi M, Gutiérrez-Sacristán A, Hanauer DA, Holmes JH, Hong C, Klann JG, Loh NHW, Luo Y, Mandl KD, Mohamad D, Moore JH, Murphy SN, Neuraz A, Ngiam KY, Omenn GS, Palmer N, Patel LP, Pedrera-Jiménez M, Sliz P, South AM, Tan ALM, Taylor DM, Taylor BW, Torti C, Vallejos AK, Wagholikar KB, Weber GM, Cai T.
J Med Internet Res
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Making Tools that People Will Use: User-Centered Design in Computational Biology Research.
Authors: Goldman M, Gehlenborg N.
Pac Symp Biocomput
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Guidelines for reporting single-cell RNA-seq experiments.
Authors: Füllgrabe A, George N, Green M, Nejad P, Aronow B, Fexova SK, Fischer C, Freeberg MA, Huerta L, Morrison N, Scheuermann RH, Taylor D, Vasilevsky N, Clarke L, Gehlenborg N, Kent J, Marioni J, Teichmann S, Brazma A, Papatheodorou I.
Nat Biotechnol
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A Generic Framework and Library for Exploration of Small Multiples through Interactive Piling.
Authors: Lekschas F, Zhou X, Chen W, Gehlenborg N, Bach B, Pfister H.
IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph
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Peax: Interactive Visual Pattern Search in Sequential Data Using Unsupervised Deep Representation Learning.
Authors: Lekschas F, Peterson B, Haehn D, Ma E, Gehlenborg N, Pfister H.
Comput Graph Forum
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International electronic health record-derived COVID-19 clinical course profiles: the 4CE consortium.
Authors: Brat GA, Weber GM, Gehlenborg N, Avillach P, Palmer NP, Chiovato L, Cimino J, Waitman LR, Omenn GS, Malovini A, Moore JH, Beaulieu-Jones BK, Tibollo V, Murphy SN, Yi SL, Keller MS, Bellazzi R, Hanauer DA, Serret-Larmande A, Gutierrez-Sacristan A, Holmes JJ, Bell DS, Mandl KD, Follett RW, Klann JG, Murad DA, Scudeller L, Bucalo M, Kirchoff K, Craig J, Obeid J, Jouhet V, Griffier R, Cossin S, Moal B, Patel LP, Bellasi A, Prokosch HU, Kraska D, Sliz P, Tan ALM, Ngiam KY, Zambelli A, Mowery DL, Schiver E, Devkota B, Bradford RL, Daniar M, Daniel C, Benoit V, Bey R, Paris N, Serre P, Orlova N, Dubiel J, Hilka M, Jannot AS, Breant S, Leblanc J, Griffon N, Burgun A, Bernaux M, Sandrin A, Salamanca E, Cormont S, Ganslandt T, Gradinger T, Champ J, Boeker M, Martel P, Esteve L, Gramfort A, Grisel O, Leprovost D, Moreau T, Varoquaux G, Vie JJ, Wassermann D, Mensch A, Caucheteux C, Haverkamp C, Lemaitre G, Bosari S, Krantz ID, South A, Cai T, Kohane IS.
NPJ Digit Med
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Pattern-Driven Navigation in 2D Multiscale Visualizations with Scalable Insets.
Authors: Lekschas F, Behrisch M, Bach B, Kerpedjiev P, Gehlenborg N, Pfister H.
IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph
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Tasks, Techniques, and Tools for Genomic Data Visualization.
Authors: Nusrat S, Harbig T, Gehlenborg N.
Comput Graph Forum
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Lineage: Visualizing Multivariate Clinical Data in Genealogy Graphs.
Authors: Nobre C, Gehlenborg N, Coon H, Lex A.
IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph
View full abstract on Pubmed