AlgiPharma CMO Dr Yngve Mikkelsen Advances Research into Responsible AI in Medicine
AlgiPharma CMO Dr Yngve Mikkelsen Advances Research into Responsible AI in Medicine
Artificial intelligence has enormous potential in medicine, but healthcare presents challenges that do not exist in many other industries. Medical data are complex, highly variable and sensitive, and an AI system that performs well in one setting may not necessarily work equally well in another.
AlgiPharma’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr Yngve Mikkelsen, MD, MSc, DBA, is exploring these challenges through a series of research papers focused on the use of data and artificial intelligence in clinical environments.
Dr Mikkelsen combines more than 15 years of clinical-development experience with more than 20 years in healthcare and industry management. His career has included senior positions at Pfizer, Biogen, Akershus University Hospital and LINK Medical Research. He is a physician specialising in anaesthesiology and holds qualifications in management, health economics and business administration.
More recently, he has developed specialist expertise at the intersection of medicine, data and AI for business through his ongoing studies at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. His latest peer-reviewed research illustrates why this combination of medical and technological expertise matters. In one of a series of articles (published and in preparation), Dr Mikkelsen tested AI-based information-retrieval approaches across 294 experimental conditions. The results showed that the clinical context in which an AI model is used—including the type of medical documentation and how a question is asked—can influence performance as much as the choice of AI model itself. The practical message is important: healthcare organisations cannot simply select a highly ranked AI model and assume it will perform reliably with their own data. Local testing and validation are essential.
A companion study examined what happens inside AI models when they process clinical information. It found that models specifically trained for information retrieval generally produced more useful representations, while a mathematical correction could improve some poorly performing models without retraining them. Importantly, the paper stresses that such approaches still require validation using the data and clinical setting in which they will ultimately be used. His research also reflects a principle particularly relevant to medicine: AI should not simply be powerful—it must be tested, understood and used responsibly in the context where decisions are made.
For AlgiPharma, this expertise adds another dimension to our clinical-development capabilities. As a research-based biopharmaceutical company developing novel alginate oligosaccharide technologies, rigorous interpretation of data and evidence is fundamental to our work. Dr Mikkelsen’s combination of clinical medicine, drug development, health economics and AI provides AlgiPharma with informed leadership as increasingly sophisticated data and digital technologies become part of pharmaceutical research and decision-making.
Mikkelsen Y. Clinical Context Variables Collectively Rival Model Choice in Embedding-Based Retrieval: Multi-Corpus Benchmark Study. JMIR Med Inform. 2026 May 7;14:e94241. doi: 10.2196/94241. PMID: 42097608; PMCID: PMC13195371.
Mikkelsen Y. Effects of Model Choice, Corpus Context, and Post Hoc Correction on Layer-Level Embedding Degradation in Clinical Document Retrieval: Experimental Study. JMIR Med Inform 2026;14:e99639. URL: https://medinform.jmir.org/2026/1/e99639. DOI: 10.2196/99639
About AlgiPharma AS:
AlgiPharma AS is a clinical stage pharmaceutical company, founded in 2006 on decades of research and development carried out by FMC BioPolymer AS and the Institute of Biotechnology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim, Norway. AlgiPharma has completed 5 clinical trials with two formulations of its lead drug candidate, OligoG, to treat respiratory symptoms of cystic fibrosis. AlgiPharma is developing its proprietary alginate technology for:
- Delivery platforms for nanoparticles, small and large molecule-based drugs.
- Drug conjugates, adding functionality and reducing toxicity of parent compound.
- API in disease areas such as cystic fibrosis, COPD, and infectious diseases.
AlgiPharma has pharmaceutical scale production capabilities for its technology protected by a broad family of patents.
AlgiPharma owns or licenses all relevant patents upon which the technology platform and products are developed. The company is supported by national and international research programs, and collaborates with a network of key opinion leaders, highly recognized academic institutions, research and patient organizations in Europe and USA.
AlgiPharma has received more than USD 46 million in research and development grants from EU’s 7th framework program, Horizon 2020, and Eurostars programs, the Norwegian Research Council, Innovate UK, Innovation Norway, US Army through Congressional Earmark funding, the Australian R&D Tax Incentive, and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CFF).
AlgiPharma is a privately owned company registered and domiciled in Norway.
For additional information contact:
Yngvar P. Berg, CEO: yngvar.berg@algipharma.com
Arne Dessen, COO and Chairman of the Board: arne.dessen@algipharma.com
