History of the emergence of in silico medicine

Abstract

This document contains a hard-evidence-based formal historical account of the emergence of the scientific, technological and gradually medical discipline of in silico medicine. It also identifies the "father of in silico medicine" based on solid and credible data. The document/report was created entirely by Google’s Gemini – Deep Research generative Artificial Intelligence (genAI) platform on 19 March 2025. Following a thorough and independent validation, the content of the document was endorsed by Georgios S. Stamatakos on 22 March 2025. It is noted that the various versions of this Zenodo record differ only with regard to the progressive addition of metadata and not the alteration of the article itself, which remains exactly the same across all versions. A short curriculum vitae of Georgios S. Stamatakos, the father of in silico medicine Georgios S. Stamatakos (GS) is research professor of analysis and simulation of biological systems at the Institute of Communication and Computer Systems (ICCS), School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), National Technical University of Athens (NTUA), Greece (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2054-477X). He has also been a visiting professor at the Medical School, University of Saarland, Germany (1/7-15/9 2019). G. Stamatakos is the founder and the director of the In Silico Oncology and In Silico Medicine Group (ISO&ISM_G), ICCS-ECE-NTUA (www.in-silico-oncology.iccs.ntua.gr). He holds an MSc degree in electrical engineering from NTUA, an MSc degree in bioengineering from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK, and a Ph.D. degree in physics (biophysics) from NTUA. He has been a postdoctoral fellow in medical technology at ICCS-NTUA. He is globally recognized as the "father of in silico medicine", since he introduced and demonstrated, inter alia, the concept of in silico medicine through its paradigmatic form of in silico radiation oncology in 2002. This was achieved through the publication of a paper in the top-tier journal "Proceedings of the IEEE" [1], [2]. He has conceived and led the development of the "Oncosimulators" i.e. the first digital twins/virtual human twins in oncology and beyond [2], [3]. Seven cancer types have been addressed by oncosimulators so far [2]. He participated upon invitation in the US research project "Center for the Development of a Virtual Tumor (CViT)" [Project # 5U56CA113004-03, NIH-NCI, led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School (HMS)], where he introduced and presented the "Clinical Oncosimulator", developed at NTUA, on 10 April 2007 [2]. He conceived and led the development of the "Technologically Integrated Oncosimulator" (TIO) in the framework of the European Commission (EC) and Japan co-funded research project ACGT [2]. TIO was recognized as a "world first" by the EC in 2010 (end of the ACGT project) [2]. In 2010 GS proposed the approach of mimicking clinical studies in silico, a precursor of in silico clinical trials. In 2014 the advanced digital twin / virtual human twin "Technologically Integrated Oncosimulator", developed under the lead of GS was published in IEEE J. Biomed. Health Inform. GS coordinated - serving as both the overall and the scientific coordinator - the "excellent" large scale EC funded EU-US research project CHIC on mechanistic multiscale hypermodeling, artificial intelligence (AI) and oncosimulators for in silico oncology (2013-2017). The outcomes of the project were designated as "great achievements" by the EC [2]. He participated in several other EC and nationally funded research projects addressing in silico medicine as workpackage leader. In 2025 GS led the open access topic (special issue) titled "Multiscale cancer modeling, in silico oncology and digital (virtual) twins in the cancer domain" in Frontiers in Physiology. He served as editor and author in three regular papers and the editorial. He was one of the two initiators, scientific organizers and chairs of the groundbreaking First Transatlantic Workshop on Multiscale Cancer Modeling that was held in Brussels (EC-Charlemagne building) in 2008. The two scientific organizers were members of HMS-MGH (MD) and NTUA (PhD) respectively. The workshop was technically co-organized by the European Commission and the National Cancer Institute - NIH, USA [2]. [The video of G. Stamatakos's globally webcast opening lecture for the entire event, with special emphasis on in silico oncology, is openly available at https://ecancer.org/en/video/105-fundamentals-of-multiscale-modelling ]. He was one of the two editors and one of the co-authors of the transatlantic (US-EU) multiauthored textbook titled “Multiscale Cancer Modeling”, published in 2010/2011 (https://www.routledge.com/Multiscale-Cancer-Modeling/DeisboeckStamatakos/p/book/9781032919249). The textbook is grounded in the lectures of the First Transatlantic Workshop on Multiscale Cancer Modeling. In silico oncology is one of the book's highlights. He introduced the world's first university course on in silico medicine at NTUA (ECE) in 2014 [2]. He has been teaching the course ever since. The "Multiscale Cancer Modeling" textbook is used in the course extensively. He published the "History of the Emergence of In Silico Medicine", using independently verified text produced by generative artificial intelligence (genAI) in 2025 [DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18328392]. G. Stamatakos and the ISO&ISM_G, which he directs, have had a highly fruitful collaboration with 26 outstanding medical schools and medical centres/hospitals across the globe [2]. He served as a Member of the Board of Trustees of the Virtual Physiological Human Institute (now VPH - The Society for In Silico Medicine). He is Co-chair of the Cancer and In Silico Oncology Task Force of the Avicenna Alliance - Association for Predicitive Medicine. He is a member of the IEEE and the Technical Chamber of Greece. G. Stamatakos is Editor of Scientific Reports - Nature Portfolio and Associate Editor of Frontiers in Physiology - Computational Physiology and Medicine section. He serves as an expert evaluator for the EC with respect to research proposals submitted to the EC for funding. His research interests include, inter alia, in silico medicine, in silico oncology, in silico psycho-oncology, multiscale cancer modelling, digital twins, virtual human twins and artificial intelligence. Open Access References [1] Stamatakos, G. (2026). In Silico Radiation Oncology by Stamatakos et al in Proceedings of the IEEE 2002 – The foundational paper of in silico medicine as a discipline – Open Access Accepted Manuscript. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18317235 [2] Stamatakos, G. (2025, August 26). In silico medicine and digital twins through the foundational paradigm of in silico oncology: Historical landmarks and current evolutionary status - A Lecture by G. Stamatakos, the Father of In Silico Medicine. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18327123 [3] The video of the Avicenna Alliance - Association for Predictive Medicine webinar lecture of G. S. Stamatakos (2025) is openly accessible at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibPPCy-Z3yo&t=5s Additional illustrative resources Further substantiated information on the globally acknowledged father of in silico medicine in conjunction with the emergence of the discipline is available through the following open access reports: (i) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1khKt53CicwrtyUfXR-U1CkZTf4i7wehU/view (ii) https://drive.google.com/file/d/15Egph30yq2-B2yMR0kXDhYI9sR7UK5Yn/view (iii) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WIeQay1DBdae4phyoMvYvyiM5pGLRzZK/view

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