Jianlin (Jack) Cheng is the William and Nancy Thompson Distinguished Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Missouri. His research is focused on developing machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) methods and tools for big biomedical data analysis. His research group has developed numerous bioinformatics tools for analyzing protein structure and function, biological networks, and 3D genome structure, which are used by scientists around the world. His research has been supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Cheng was a recipient of the NSF CAREER award and the MU College of Engineering’s junior and senior faculty research awards.