Sylvester O. Orimaye, MPH, PhD

University of Health Sciences and Pharmacy in St. Louis (UHSP)

My research interests involve exploring the relationship between depression and Alzheimer’s disease by utilizing machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) techniques. I am developing and evaluating innovative AI-based screening methods for the early detection of depression, Alzheimer’s disease, and dementia, with a more affordable and minimally invasive approach. My contribution was part of the development of the first AI-based linguistic biomarkers for detecting mild cognitive impairment that could potentially lead to Alzheimer’s disease. My goal is to identify effective linguistic biomarkers for the early diagnosis of depression, Alzheimer’s disease, and dementia from verbal interactions. In addition, I design statistical models that predict public health outcomes, focusing on the elderly, women, adolescents, and vulnerable populations. I have also developed analytical and implementation strategies in various public health studies, including big data analytics in public health and optimization of data analysis pipelines on high-performance computing platforms.