Institute for Healthier Living Abu Dhabi taps CoreX to establish the UAE’s first bio-intelligence engine

Abu Dhabi is making a quiet but consequential move in modern medicine. The Institute for Healthier Living Abu Dhabi has partnered with CoreX to build something no country has done before.

They are creating the UAE’s first bio-intelligence engine, designed around the biology of its own people. Not borrowed data. Not imported assumptions. Real human biology, grown and studied locally, then interpreted with artificial intelligence.

At its core, this is about relevance. About asking a simple question that medicine has often dodged. What actually works for the people who live here?

As Dr Nicole Sirotin puts it, “Our partnership with CoreX to build the UAE’s first national bio-intelligence engine is about bringing advanced AI together with patient-specific organ-on-chip models for more precise prediction for the Emirati population and the people we serve.”

That sentence matters more than it seems.

How does it work?

The system blends biology and computation in a way that feels closer to science fiction than standard lab work. But it is grounded, regulated, and methodical.

Here is what sits under the hood:

• Living organ-on-chip models that mimic how real human organs behave
• Patient-specific organoids grown from consenting adult cells
• Biological and molecular data fed into advanced AI models
• Population-level datasets drawn from Emirati and regional biology

Together, these parts form a learning system. AI does not guess. It observes. It studies how living human tissue responds to drugs and therapies. Then it learns patterns that traditional trials often miss.

Dr Isaac Bentwich, Founder and Global CEO of CoreX, explains it plainly. “CoreX uniquely integrates AI and organ-on-chip living biology to revolutionise medicine discovery, optimisation and validation.”

The platform is built in phases, each one adding depth and predictive power. Over time, it becomes a protected national biological intelligence resource. One that can model drug response, spot risks earlier, and support precision medicine at scale.

All of it happens inside licensed UAE facilities. All of it follows strict cultural and ethical standards. No embryos. No foetal tissue. No genetic modification. Just human-relevant science, done carefully.

Why does it matter?

Because medicine fails quietly when it relies on the wrong data.

Most drugs tested worldwide are evaluated on datasets drawn from foreign populations. Different genetics. Different metabolisms. Different environmental factors. The results travel. The assumptions do too.

This initiative flips that model.

With population-specific insights, clinicians can:

• Predict adverse drug reactions more reliably
• Tailor treatment plans to individual patients
• Reduce avoidable harm from poorly matched therapies
• Make earlier and better-informed clinical decisions

For pharmaceutical companies, the implications are just as big. Drugs can be evaluated against biology that actually reflects the UAE population. That means safer development paths and fewer surprises later.

Sarah Miller, Co-Founder, President, and GCC Lead of CoreX, captures the scale of it. “With CoreX, the UAE is bringing something the world has never had. A national engine where AI can learn from real organ-on-chip human biology at a population scale.”

That is not marketing language. That is a structural shift.

It also reduces reliance on animal testing. When living human models do the learning, fewer animals are needed to fill the gaps.

The context

Zoom out, and the timing makes sense.

Abu Dhabi has been steadily positioning itself as a hub for longevity science, precision health, and biomedical innovation. This partnership strengthens that trajectory. It also sends a clear signal to global pharma and life science companies looking for serious, human-relevant research environments.

By anchoring CoreX institutionally, the Abu Dhabi ecosystem becomes more attractive to international partnerships, not because of incentives alone, but because of infrastructure and intent.

At a national level, this supports health security. It builds sovereign biological knowledge. It reduces reliance on external datasets that may not align with local realities.

And globally, it aligns with a broader shift toward human-centric healthcare. One where prediction matters as much as treatment. One where prevention is smarter, not louder.

The UAE is not just adopting advanced tools. It is shaping how they are built. On its own terms. For its own people.