Can Ergen-Behr develops AI models for more personalised treatments

10/13/2026

Dr Can Ergen-Behr has been appointed as the new Junior Professor of Single-Cell Medical Systems Biology at the University of Würzburg.

Can Ergen-Behr with JMU Vice-President Caroline Kisker on his appointment as a junior professor. (Image: Robert Emmerich / Universität Würzburg)

Can Ergen-Behr is a doctor and an expert in computational biology, that is, in the application of information technology to biology. With his research group, ‘Artificial Intelligence in Translational Systems Medicine’, he is investigating how artificial intelligence can help to better understand individual disease progression and tailor treatments more precisely to individual patients.

Better predicting individual disease progression

People with the same diagnosis can exhibit very different disease progression and respond differently to the same treatment. Can Ergen-Behr wants to understand the biological mechanisms underlying these differences.

To this end, the scientist is developing AI models that combine clinical data with single-cell and spatial molecular measurements. The aim is not only to better predict individual disease progression but also to identify the molecular causes of variations between patients. His long-term goal is to lay the foundations for more precise and personalised treatment decisions.

“With artificial intelligence, we can now link large volumes of biological and clinical data and thereby identify new correlations. I am very much looking forward to further developing this research at the University of Würzburg and thus opening up new avenues for more precise medicine,” says the new professor.

From clinician to data scientist

Can Ergen-Behr studied medicine and physics at RWTH Aachen University and subsequently completed his clinical and scientific training at the University Medical Centre Hamburg-Eppendorf. From 2021 to 2025, he conducted research at the University of California, Berkeley, where he developed machine learning methods for analysing high-dimensional single-cell data.

He took up his post as an assistant professor in Würzburg on 15 June 2026. With his appointment at JMU, he is now combining his clinical experience as an internist with the development of modern AI methods for single-cell, spatial and clinical data.