PQG Short Courses

Short workshops that explore applied AI, machine learning, and tools and techniques for analyzing  genetic, genomic, and health data. 

Upcoming Workshops:

Workshop Overview

This three-day workshop introduces biomedical and health researchers and practitioners and data analysts to the modern AI toolbox—large language models, foundation models, and generative diffusion models—through a real-world grounded, hands-on lens. The workshop will emphasize intuitive explanations, ethical and safety concerns, and step-by-step coding labs so that non-technical clinicians and health researchers and practitioners and data analysts can meaningfully engage with, critique, and begin to prototype AI tools in their own domains

Program Schedule

Day 1 — Language Models

Participants will first learn how language models and transformers can be adapted to clinical notes for tasks like summarization and question answering, reflecting emerging uses of LLMs in documentation, decision support, and patient communication.

Day 2 — Foundation Models & Genetic Data

We broaden the scope to foundation models in genomics, using public SNP data to demonstrate how genomic “language models” such as the Nucleotide Transformer can learn reusable DNA representations for phenotype prediction and other downstream tasks.

Day 3 — Generative AI & Diffusion Models

We focus on generative AI, unpacking diffusion models and their growing role in medical imaging— in image generation, reconstruction, and denoising—before guiding participants through training a simple diffusion model on image data.

Event Details

Dates: March 18-20, 2026
Time: 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Location: Kresge G2, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

Attendee Information

Attendees are responsible for arranging their own accommodations. The following nearby hotels are provided for convenience:

• The Inn at Longwood Medical
• The Longwood Inn
• Courtyard by Marriott Boston Brookline
• The Colonnade Boston

Parking & Transportation

Parking is available at nearby garages, including the Longwood Galleria Garage (350 Longwood Ave) and the 375 Longwood Ave Garage. Public transportation is strongly encouraged. The venue is accessible via the MBTA Green Line (E Line) – please exit at the Brigham Circle stop – as well as Bus 39, with service to the 677 Huntington Ave stop. We recommend allowing extra time for parking, traffic, and walking to the venue.

Food & Refreshments

Light refreshments (coffee and snacks) will be provided during the short course. Participants are responsible for arranging their own lunch each day.

What to Bring

Please bring a laptop.