Orly Alter (Hebrew: אורלי אלטר) is an Israeli-American physicist, geneticist, and mathematician, and a USTAR associate professor of bioengineering and human genetics at the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute and the Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah.[3] She has published on quantum measurement, genomic signal processing, and tensor decompositions.
Education and career
Alter began attending school at Tel Aviv University in Israel and graduated in October 1989 magna cum laude with her bachelors of science in physics.[3] After receiving her undergraduate degree, she began pursuing her Ph.D. in applied physics at the Stanford University in California, USA. She completed her Ph.D. with a thesis on "Impossibility of Determining the Quantum Wavefunction of a Single System and a Fundamental Limit to External Force Detection," under the mentorship of Yoshihisa Yamamoto in January 1999[4] and then moved onto a postdoctoral fellowship in genetics, remaining at Stanford.[5] Alter moved to the University of Utah in 2010, where she joined the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute as a USTAR Associate Professor of Bioengineering.[6]
Following this, she became a member of Cancer Control and Population Sciences Program, and was co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Prism AI Therapeutics in 2024.[7]
Research
Alter has one published book named Quantum Measurement of a Single System,[8][9] co-authored with Yamamoto, and another book in preparation, Genomic Signal Processing: Discovery of Principles of Nature from Matrix and Tensor Modeling of Large-Scale Molecular Biological Data.[10] Alter's work on finding patterns in DNA finds predictors indicative of a woman's risk for ovarian cancer,[11] and she uses mathematical models to improve the outcomes for women with ovarian cancer.[12][13][14]
Alter's team identified a DNA pattern as a predictor of survival in glioblastoma patients using new mathematical methods, which was reported in 2020.[15]
^Alter, Orly. Genomic Signal Processing: Discovery of Principles of Nature from Matrix and Tensor Modeling. Wiley. ISBN978-1119078371.
^"Increasing Accuracy of Diagnosis, Prognosis". USA Today; Farmingdale. February 2016. p. 8.|volume=144 |issue=2849}}
^"U. researchers' mathematical models could provide better ovarian cancer treatment, outcomes". The Salt Lake Tribune; Salt Lake City, Utah. 15 April 2015.
^"Calculating Cancer Cures". National Academy of Engineering (NAE) Innovation Podcast and Radio Series. NAE in Collaboration with WTOP Radio. 19 April 2019. Retrieved 12 March 2025.
