Empowering families in motion

For many families, a healthy lifestyle is a constant juggling act between busy schedules and challenging environments. Without the right support, there is real potential for children to slip off a healthy growth path.

Dr. Sam Liu, Director of the Digital Health Lab at the University of Victoria, is working to provide this support by redefining how we use everyday technology to prevent chronic disease. His research focuses on transforming mobile apps from distractions into personalized health partners. By leveraging big data to predict behaviors and health outcomes, Sam and his team are creating tailored approaches that fit each family’s unique lifestyle, a critical step for long-term adoption.

To ensure these evidence-based strategies don’t stay trapped in a lab, Sam developed Pathverse, a platform “paying it forward” by enabling other researchers to rapidly scale community-based programs. It’s transforming research into accessible, real-world tools, empowering families to live healthier lives, one digital step at a time.

Explore more of Sam’s work and its impact on British Columbians below.