Biography:

Luis Kun is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of the CHDS at National Defense University. He graduated from the
Merchant Marine Academy in Uruguay, and received a BSEE, an MSEE, and a Ph.D. in BME from UCLA. He is a
Life Fellow of IEEE, of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), of the
International Academy of Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE), and of the International Union for Physical
and Engineering Sciences in Medicine (IUPESM). He currently is the immediate Past President of the IEEE Society
for Social Implications of Technology (SSIT).
Dr. Kun worked at IBM for 14 years, and was Director of Medical Systems Technology and Strategic Planning for
Cedars Sinai Medical Center. He was the Senior IT Advisor for the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research
(AHCPR), and later a Distinguished Fellow for the CDC where he was the Senior Computer Scientist for
Bioterrorism, and later was the Acting Chief Information Technology Officer for the National Immunization
Program. He was an Adjunct Professor of Public Health Informatics at Emory University School of Public Health.
Kun has made numerous seminal contributions to healthcare, biomedical engineering, IT, public health, and national
security. He served in SSIT & Computer Society BOG, and EMBS ADCOM. He was founding Editor in Chief of
Springer’s Journal Health and Technology in 2010-20, and was Chairman of IFMBE’s Global Citizen Safety and
Security WG in 2006-2018.
For IEEE-USA, in 1993 he was Founding Chair of the IEEE Electronic Medical Record and High-Performance
Computers & Communications WG for the Health Care Engineering Policy Committee. He received the 1998
Administrator’s Award of Merit from the US Surgeon General: “For exceptional dedication and professional
achievement that have greatly enhanced the recognition of AHCPR’s research in the High-Performance Computing
and Communications Program.” On the Medical Technology Policy Committee, he was Founding Chair of the
Bioterrorism WG prior to 911 (later included Homeland Security), and helped create the Genetics WG.
Dr. Kun received the 2002 IEEE-USA Citation of Honor Award: “For exemplary contributions in the inception and
implementation of a health care information technology vision in the United States”. In 2007, he was the Founding
Chair of the Critical Infrastructure Protection Committee. For EMBS, he was a Founding Member of the Editorial
Board of the IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine magazine, and was Distinguished
Lecturer multiple times. He was the invited inaugural keynote speaker for EMBC 2010 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
For the Computer Society, he has been DVP since 2003, received the 2011 Golden Core Award, and was named
Distinguished Contributor in 2025. At SSIT he has been chairing the DL Program since 2016. In 2026, he became an
IEEE Systems Council Distinguished Lecturer (2026-2028).
Kun received the 2009 AIMBE’s first-ever Fellow Advocate Award, which is presented to “a Fellow who has made
outstanding contributions to advancing federal policies assisting the medical and biological engineering field”. He is
a member of the IEEE Eta Kappa Nu BOG. In 2009, he was named “Profesor Honoris Causa” by Universidad
Favaloro in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and in 2013 was named “Distinguished Visitor” by the City of Puebla, Mexico.
In 2014, he was named Honorary Professor of the EE Dept. at the School of Engineering of the University in
Montevideo, Uruguay. In 2017, he was named Visiting Prof. by the National Technological University of Buenos
Aires, Argentina. He received Mexico’s Medal of Merit from the National Unit of Engineering Associations. In
2018, he was elected IFMBE Honorary Life Member.
Dr. Kun has been an invited keynote/lecturer worldwide nearly 600 times. He was an invited lecturer to the US
Congress staffers of the Homeland Security Committee on the Public Health Critical Infrastructure Protection. He
was an invited speaker to the White House on July 8, 1997, and on August 5, 1997, President Clinton signed the
first Telehealth bill to treat patients from their home. In 2002, 2004, and 2008 he produced three special issues for
policy makers which were published in the IEEE EMBS magazine, and these were dedicated to Bioterrorism,
Homeland Security, and Health Care and Public Health Critical Infrastructure, respectively, and each was distributed
to members of the US Congress.