DANIEL KRAFT

Published by Daniel at July 3, 2023

Daniel Kraft is a physician-inventor who has dedicated his life to showing the world the potential of technology in medicine...

Daniel Kraft is a notable physician, researcher, entrepreneur, member of the Kauffman Fellows Society (Class 13), and part of the Inaugural Class of the Aspen Institute Health Innovator Fellowship 2015. Kraft, originally from the U.K., attended Brown University in 1986 to pursue a Bachelor’s Degree in Biochemistry, where he graduated Cum Laude in 1990. Afterward, he started Medical School at Stanford University, obtained his M.D. degree in 1996, and chose a Harvard Combined Residency in Internal Medicine & Pediatrics at the Massachusetts General Hospital before returning to his Alma Mater in 2000 to complete fellowships in Hematology/Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplantation..(1,2,3)

After completing his fellowships at Stanford University, Dr. Kraft started working in postdoctoral research in the laboratory of Dr. Irving Weissman. He also occupied an NIH-funded faculty position for eight years with Stanford University and as clinical faculty for the pediatric bone marrow transplantation service at the University of California San Francisco, focusing on Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine..(1,3,4)

Harvesting for a better option

During his postdoctoral fellowship, Dr. Kraft had extensive biomedical research experiences and exposure to several cases, which allowed him to successfully complete the Stanford BioDesign Program. He developed multiple patents that targeted stem cell therapies. It stands out MarrowMiner, an FDA-approved, minimally invasive device that allows the harvest of bone marrow stem cells rapidly and cost-effectively. Along with other colleagues, he founded RegenMed Systems in 2010, a company dedicated to developing devices to enable adult stem cell-based regenerative therapies. (1,5,6)

Looking Through the Eyes of the Future

Throughout his life, this scientist has shown his potential as an innovator and entrepreneur. Examples are creating “The Online Discount Medical Bookstore,” the first online medical marketplace, and implementing the first text-paging system he founded during his residency. As a true leader, Dr. Kraft has been heavily involved in several projects that aim to support technological advances in science, being one of the Singularity University. In 2008 he joined this global community that helps entrepreneurs make a positive impact and “tackle the world’s biggest challenges,” serving as Faculty Chair of Medicine and Neuroscience. A few years later, he came up with a unique program to explore rapidly developing technologies and seek their potential in biomedicine and healthcare. He founded the Exponential Medicine program at Singularity University in 2011, where he is currently Chair. This project is focused on gathering world-class experts, innovators, and organizations to leverage reinvention and the future of medicine. The topics discussed during this event held each November in San Diego are typically digital health, artificial intelligence, robotics, and nanotechnology.(2,7,8)

An AI-driven Healthcare World

Another aspect of Daniel Kraft’s life is his contribution to making healthcare more comfortable and straightforward through digital health. Taking this into consideration, he created Digital.Health, a website that is currently under development for physicians, technologists, and healthcare providers interested in technological advances regarding digital health tools, solutions, and resources. In 2015 he founded IntelliMedicine, a platform that offers personalized, data-driven medicine and seeks to stop polypharmacy and low drug adherence. As a result of Dr. Kraft’s interest in re-imagining medicine’s future with technology, he has served as a Medical Advisor of several AI-powered healthcare startups, including Arterys and Sense.ly. He considers AI and machine learning crucial factors for what is next in medicine. The AI-driven healthcare world will broaden patient access, treatment will be more personalized, and several diseases will dramatically decrease by improving preventive measures.(2,4,9,10,11)

Sharing the knowledge and spreading the word

His scientific work has been very prolific in terms of research and publications. His work has been published in different journals, including Nature and Science. His research mainly focuses on novel therapies regarding hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for malignant and non-malignant diseases in adults and children. Additionally, Kraft is determined to share his findings and his hopes for the future of medicine with the world. He has acted as a speaker in multiple sessions for TED and TEDMED, discussing his vision about the impact of rapidly developing technologies in the medical era. More specifically, in June 2011, he talked about the future of revolutionizing medicine, the role of artificial intelligence in powering new tools and tests, and shaping the precision medicine field by designing pills that can adapt to our individual needs. In his passion for promoting science in 2017, Dr. Kraft became the Chief Medical Correspondent for TechNationHealth. This radio program fosters dialogue between science leaders and provides technology-related commentary; more recently jumped into a new project, creating a Newsletter named “Future of Health and Medicine^.”(1,9,10,11)

Alliance during the pandemic

Although Kraft served as a Life Sciences advisor to the XPRIZE for several years and worked to develop a new XPRIZE focused on early cancer detection and incentives innovation for this field in 2016, he recently embarked on a new challenge with this foundation. In March 2020, he was asked to preside over the XPRIZE Pandemic Alliance Task Force, which focuses on discovering new solutions to the current pandemic and preventing future ones, which started with the creation of the Rapid COVID Testing XPRIZE.(9,10)^”

Top physician, awarded innovator, and accomplished pilot

Daniel Kraft has received much recognition throughout his life. He has been included in the top 40 of the Smartest People in Healthcare, top 10 Internet Smart Doctors In the World (2013), and Digital Health-top 50. Besides his life in medicine, he is passionate about Aerospace Medicine. He is enrolled as a flight surgeon and as Air National Guard Officer in F-15 and F-16 fighter squadrons and has published research with NASA.(1,11)