Speaker Profile
Ph.D., CSO & Co-Founder, Adaptive Biotech
Biography
Harlan Robins is a Co Founder of Adaptive Biotechnologies, a commercialstage biotech company that aims to translate the genetics of the adaptiveimmune system into clinical products to diagnose and treat disease. Priorto cofoundingconfounding Adaptive, Harlan served in various roles at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC) in the Computational Biology Program, including Assistant Faculty Member, Associate, and Full Member and Head of the program. Interested in the mathematics behind genetics andobserving the potential utility of high level mathematics to study problemsin the biological sciences, Harlan took a postdoctoral appointment at the Institute for Advance Study in Princeton under famed biologist Dr. Arnold Levine. With Dr. Levine, he concentrated on developing bioinformaticalgorithms for micro RNA targets and bacterial genome analysis, a precursorto his faculty appointment at FHCRC in the Computational Biology Group, Public Health Sciences and Human Biology Divisions.
Session Abstract – PMWC 2026 Silicon Valley
Track Chair:
Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures and Gad Getz, Broad Institute
PMWC Award Ceremony
• Steve Wozniak, Apple
• Greg Brockman, OpenAI
Fireside Chat
• Vinod Khosla, Khosla Ventures
• Greg Brockman, OpenAI
Target Discovery: Beyond Genomics – Revealing Hidden Layers of Biology with AI
• Chair: Cindy Lawley, Olink
• Aritro Nath, City of Hope
• John Quackenbush, Harvard
• Massa Shoura, Phinomics
• Omar Serang, DNAnexus
Foundation Models of Human Cancer Biology to Predict Clinical Outcomes
• Ron Alfa, Noetik
Mechanistic Modeling of the Human Immune System: A Data-Integrated Approach to Target and Biomarker Discovery
• Liat Dassa, CytoReason
Biological Foundation Models: Harmonizing Data to Accelerate Drug Discovery
• Vitalay Fomin, Numenos
From Prediction to Translation: AI and In Vivo Validation to Improve Drug Development Success
• Gabriel Musso, BioSymetrics
Interpretable AI for Biomarker Discovery: Accelerating Drug Development and Advancing Precision Medicine
• Chair: Shivanni Kummar, PATHOMIQ
• Dale Muzzey, Myriad Genetics
• Sanoj Punnen, University of Miami
• Mark Burkard, UI
Can AI Really Create the Next Blockbuster Drug? Closing the Loop from Drug Discovery to Development
• Chair: Amar Das, Guardant Health
• Ari Caroline, Weave Bio
• Dina Katabi, Emerald/MIT
• Andrei Georgescu, Vivodyne
• James Zou, Stanford
Gemini Digital Twins Accelerate Precision Medicine
• Collin Hill, Aitia
Scaling Rare Disease Discovery with AI: From Genomic Data to Therapeutic Insights
• Lisa Gurry, GeneDx
Limited Sample Models for Faster Lead Discovery, High Accuracy, and Regulatory Grade AI
• Lalin Theverapperuma, Expert Intelligence
Enabling Targeted Precision Drug & Gene Delivery with Predictive AI
• Andre Watson, Ligandal
Is AI the New Drug or the New Therapeutic Modality
• Chair: Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures
• Michael J. Kahana, Nia Therapeutics
• Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Xaira
