Galter Library is excited to welcome health informaticist and librarian Josh Richardson, PhD, MS, MLIS, as the new Senior Research Scientist. With over 15 years of experience in both research and library settings, Richardson specializes in the development, implementation and evaluation of health information technology interventions to address community members’ information needs.

“I’m excited that my new role enables me to participate in multiple cutting-edge efforts to which Galter is either leading or contributing. Those efforts constitute a robust research portfolio that addresses ways to promote open science using emerging data standards and technologies, and where they don’t yet exist, Galter can be - and often is - at the forefront of their development,” says Richardson. “These initiatives are promoting science in ways that make research more effective, efficient, and inclusive.”

Richardson will combine his extensive background in health informatics with this leadership position to advance the library’s research and knowledge management portfolio across priority areas including open science, digital infrastructures, artificial intelligence, evaluation and mobilization of computable biomedical knowledge.

“I’m quickly learning that there is an abundance of opportunities that Galter has to offer its patrons and partners, which presents a unique challenge to further develop the research portfolio in a way that generates the most value while supporting the scalability of Galter’s services and research offerings,” states Richardson.

Before his role as Senior Research Scientist, Richardson worked at RTI International researching health IT’s impact on clinical care while leading and contributing to several winning contract and grant applications. Most recently he was a co-investigator on a National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant-funded effort to determine public perceptions of the trustworthiness of ChatGPT and expectations for healthcare. 

He also has experience in various library settings and served as Assistant Library Director for Clinical Services at Weill Cornell in New York, implementing research methods in the assessment of clinical reference, bioinformatics, and data science services. His recent research delves into the health informatics and literacy ecosystem, exploring the discoverability of health information by optimizing the accessibility and computability of data in research articles. Richardson says that he is “particularly interested in developing new knowledge around ways the library contributes to knowledge dissemination around the research enterprise and within a learning health system.”

With a strong commitment to a human-centered approach, Richardson aims to cultivate a space for inquiry around understanding and prioritizing the needs of the Feinberg community. He is looking forward to building on the foundation of established partnerships and fostering innovative collaborations that improve equal access.

“I’m passionate about people. Therefore, I’m excited to be collaborating with faculty, researchers, students, and many other constituencies around ways to make research data more FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable) as well as leveraging new technologies that deliver knowledge to positively impact health. And most of all, I’m looking forward to collaborating with a great team of experts here in Galter and across the broader Feinberg community.” 

Galter is thrilled that Josh Richardson has joined the team and will add his expertise in strategic leadership and interdisciplinary collaboration to the many ongoing projects here at the library. He will support the work of the Galter team and partners on the InvenioRDM Project, the Generalist Repository Ecosystem Initiative (GREI), the National Evaluation Center (NEC), and additional efforts to enhance research data management infrastructures and services.

Josh Richardson  orcid.org/0000-0003-3066-2673   |  Email Josh

Written by Emma Wilson