Biostat E-News
Summer-Fall 2006
Summer Institute in Statistical Genetics
Summer was a busy season for UW Biostat, and we were happy to see many old friends and colleagues in Seattle.
First on the summer agenda was the Summer Institute in Statistical Genetics, directed by Professor and Chair Bruce Weir. The Institute has been held at North Carolina State University for each of the past 10 years and the move across country was very successful. There were nearly 300 participants enrolled in one or more of 17 different modules that introduce geneticists to modern statistical procedures and introduce statisticians to the challenges of working with genetic data. Other Biostatistics faculty teaching in the Institute were Bill Barlow, Lurdes Inoue, Jim Hughes, Katie Kerr, John Storey and David Yanez. Biostat postdoc Amy Anderson also taught, as did Matthew Stephens and Elizabeth Thompson from Statistics and Josh Akey and Joe Felsenstein from Genome Sciences. The accompanying Seattle Showcase Symposium in Statistical Genetics featured groundbreaking work by Charles Brenner (UC Berkeley), William Hill (Edinburgh), Gil McVean (Oxford), Ross Prentice (FHCRC and UW Biostat), Eric Schadt (Rosetta/Merck and UW Biostat) and John Storey (UW Biostat).
"Moving the Summer Institute was a huge task that required considerable effort by Biostat staff," said Bruce, "but many of the instructors and participants commented on how seamless the transition appeared. Cynthia Marks led a very able team and Brian Haney worked miracles to create a computing lab in the South Campus Center. I am especially grateful to Haewon Kim for coping with an increased work load right at the busiest time of his year. The Institute is another jewel in the statistical genetics crown here at UW."
Breslow Conference
On August 4, the Department held the Conference on
Statistical Methods in Epidemiology and Observational Studies, to honor
Professor and former Chair Norm Breslow. A large group
of alumni, faculty, students and other colleagues gathered to celebrate
Norm and the impact and trajectory of his body of theoretical work in
epidemiology and observational studies. The conference featured an
all-star line-up of experts, providing an overview of historical and
current developments before delving into future research directions in
the field. The first Norman E. Breslow Distinguished Lectureship was
awarded to Mitchell Gail, Chief of the Biostatistics Branch of the
National Cancer Institute, who delivered the first Breslow Lecture,
"Absolute Risk: Clinical Applications and Controversies," at the
conference.
A pre-conference reception and poster session and a conference dinner held at the UW Club rounded out the event, providing plenty of time for relaxing and socializing. We'd like to extend our sincere thanks to the organizing committee: Xihong Lin, Harvard University (Co-Chair); Thomas Lumley, UW (Co-chair); Nilanjan Chatterjee, National Cancer Institute; Charmaine Dean, Simon Fraser University; Danyu Lin, University of North Carolina; Geert Molenberghs, Hasselt University; and David Yanez, UW (Local Arrangement Chair).
JSM Alumni Reception
Since the Joint Statistical Meetings were held here in Seattle this
year, Professor Dave Yanez and his wife Miriam Treggari
held an alumni reception in their beautiful Laurelhurst home. Alumni,
students, staff, faculty and former faculty and postdocs gathered to
share some food, enjoy the beautiful Lake Washington view and catch up
with old friends.
A big, lively group of alumni gathered at the reception, including Todd Alonzo (Ph.D., 2000, Pepe), Tracy Bergemann (Ph.D., 2004, Zhao), Petra Buzkova (Ph.D., 2004, Lumley), Jianwen Cai (Ph.D. 1992, Prentice), Jinbo Chen (Ph.D., 2002, Breslow), Erin (Hade) Craigmile (M.S. 2001, Wakefield), Marcia A. Ciol (Ph.D., 1991, Self), Mariza de Andrade (Ph.D., 1990, Thompson), Ann Derleth (Ph.D., 1977, Thompson), Lori Dodd (Ph.D. 2001, Pepe), Dan Gillen Ph.D. 2003, Emerson), Katherine Guthrie (Ph.D., 2001, Sheppard), Bill Griffith (Ph.D., 1995, McKnight), Nicole Mayer Hamblett (Ph.D., 1999, Self), Jim Hughes (Ph.D. 1980, Chapman), Holly Janes (Ph.D., 2005, Pepe), Laura Lee Johnson (Ph.D., 2002, Diehr), Michael Kosorok (Ph.D., 1991, Fleming), Michal Kulich (Ph.D. 1997, Lin), Brenda Kurland (Ph.D., 2002, Heagerty), Elizabeth (Kexel) Krantz (M.S. 2000, Leblanc), Bryan Langholz (Ph.D., 1984, Kronmal), Lillian Lin (Ph.D., 1990, Fisher), Hao Liu (Ph.D. 2004, Wellner), Ted Lystig (Ph.D., 2001, Hughes), Steve McKinney (Ph.D., 1995, Fleming), Barbara Metch (Ph.D., 1983, McKnight), Erica Moodie (Ph.D., 2006, Richardson), Zoe Moodie (Ph.D., 2001, Prentice), Jennifer (Clark) Nelson (Ph.D. 1999, Pepe), Monika Peckova (Ph.D., 1997, Fleming), Margaret Pepe (Ph.D., 1986, Fleming), Lixuan Qin, (Ph.D. 2005, Self), Mary Redman (Ph.D., 2004, Brumback), Marie Reilly (Ph.D., 1991, Pepe), Amy Chen Rundle (Ph.D., 1984, Feigl), Jon Schildcrout (Ph.D. 2004, ), Bryan Shepherd (Ph.D., 2005, Gilbert), Richard Wang (M.S., 2003, Heagerty) and Haibo Zhou (Ph.D., 1992, Pepe/Stat grad). Thanks to Dave and Miriam for hosting this important event.
Lindsay Named Head of Penn State Department of Statistics
Congratulations to Bruce G. Lindsay (Ph.D. 1978,
Breslow), who has recently been appointed as Head of the Department of
Statistics at Penn State. Bruce, Willaman Professor of Statistics and
director of the Center for Likelihood Studies at Penn, is known for
making fundamental scientific contributions in the areas of
likelihood-based statistical inferences and methods for mixture models,
adding to the foundations of the statistical theory in this arena.
"Dr. Lindsay has been an academic leader in the department for many years, as well as twice providing leadership as its interim or acting head," comments Daniel J. Larson, the Verne M. Willaman Dean of the Eberly College of Science. "I am delighted that the statistics faculty and the college now will have the benefit of his strong leadership as the head of the Department of Statistics."
In conjunction with his work in statistical theory, Lindsay develops statistical methods that are useful for research in other scientific disciplines. In recent years he has worked on statistical challenges in the analysis of key biological data for genomic studies. Lindsay's research work has been recognized with a Humboldt Senior Scientist Research Award in 1990 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1996. In 1997 he was co-winner of the Snedecor Award given by the Council of Presidents of Statistical Societies. In 1996, and 1998 - 2000, warming up for the real thing, Bruce served as acting head of the Penn State Department of Statistics. In 1998 he received a certificate of recognition from the Penn State chapter of the scientific research society Sigma Xi for outstanding support of students doing research. He has also supervised 22 doctoral students, 13 of whom now are faculty members at other institutions of higher education.
Kosorok Named Chair of UNC Chapel Hill Department of Biostatistics
Congratulations to Michael R. Kosorok (Ph.D. 1991,
Fleming), who has recently been recruited as Chair of the Department of
Biostatistics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Michael, formerly a professor of Statistics and Biostatistics & Medical
Informatics at the University of Wisconsin (1991-2006), is taking over a
department that has a strong UW Biostatistics contingent.
Jianwen Cai (Ph.D. 1992, Prentice) who served as UNC
Biostatistics' interim chair, and her husband, Haibo
Zhou (Ph.D. 1992, Pepe/Stat grad) are on faculty, as are two
other alums, David Couper (Ph.D. 1994, Pepe) and
Petra Buzkova (Ph.D. 2004, Lumley). In addition,
Danyu Lin, who served on the UW Biostat faculty from
1991-2000 and is currently a UW Biostat Affiliate Professor, has been on
the UNC Biostatistics faculty since he moved his family to North
Carolina in 2000.
Mike, a strong leader, researcher and teacher, was elected a Fellow of the American Statistical Association this summer at JSM. He was recognized for theoretical and applied contributions to empirical processes and semiparametric methods, particularly in event-time analysis, clinical trials, and microarray analysis, and also for statistical methods for cystic fibrosis research. He is principal investigator of the NCI grant, "Semiparametric and Empirical Process Methods In Oncology" and serves as an associate editor of Annals of Statistics. His national service includes serving as Chair of the Data Safety Monitoring Committee of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (2001-2006) and as a member of the Data Safety Monitoring Board of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (1999-2006).
Like many of his colleagues, Michael has a musical side. He is an avid amateur composer, and holds a bachelor's degree in Music Composition from Brigham Young University (1988) and a master's in Music Composition from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1999). The style of his music is "contemporary classical," or what some people refer to as "new music," and includes works for voice, chamber instrumental groups, and percussion. Several of his scores have been performed at the University of Wisconsin.
Clarice Weinberg Honored for Statistical Achievements
Congratulations to Biostat alum Clarice "Clare"
Weinberg (Ph.D. 1980, Fisher), whose leadership in the field
has garnered her two prestigious awards over the past year. Clare, who
received her masters in math from Brandeis University and her doctorate
in biomath from UW under the guidance of Dr. Lloyd Fisher, is currently
Chief of the Biostatistics Branch at the National Institute of
Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).
The first honor was the ASA 2005 Nathan Mantel Award for lifetime contributions to statistics in epidemiology. "A general research theme of mine has been the development of improved methods for design and analysis that account for sources of bias, missing data, response heterogeneity and mismeasurement in epidemiologic studies," Weinberg said.
Clare also received the Fourth Annual Janet L. Norwood Award for outstanding achievement by a woman in the statistical sciences. The award, established to recognize women of exceptional merit in the quantitative sciences, helps to promote the active involvement of women in the statistical sciences at all levels, from high school through senior faculty and scientists.
Clare takes her role as a mentor to young women seriously. "My summer student, who just graduated from high school, won the best in her category (high school level) for the science poster we did for the show NIEHS had for all the participants in our Summers of Discovery Program. Here is a photo taken of me with my student, Eun 'Grace' Joo, who claims she wants to be a biostatistician when she grows up! Maybe she will one day end up at UW."
Nancy Flournoy Receives NISS Distinguished Service Award at JSM
Nancy Flournoy (Ph.D. 1982, Fisher) received a
Distinguished Service Award from the National Institute of Statistical
Science (NISS) at the Joint Statistical Meetings in Seattle this August.
Nancy was instrumental in developing the Institute's vision and securing
the seed money that launched it in 1991. She was also chosen because of
her long term service on the Board of Trustees and her support of NISS
affiliate programs. NISS was established to identify and foster
high-impact, cross-disciplinary research involving the statistical
sciences.
Nancy is currently Professor and Chair of the Department of Statistics at the University of Missouri, Columbia. Early in her career, Nancy served here in Seattle as an affiliate professor at UW Biostat and a member at the Hutch. Her substantive work on statistical theory was motivated by problems encountered while working with the Seattle bone marrow transplant team. Her co-author Dr. E. Donnall Thomas won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his work on transplantation (shared with the developer of kidney transplants) in October, 1990. He put together an interdisciplinary team of scientists that pioneered bone marrow transplantation beginning in 1969. Nancy joined the team in 1973 with responsibility for experimental design and analysis, and proceeded to create a unique shared information support system to facilitate the cross-disciplinary research required for the success of this enterprise. This collaboration led to 59 papers between 1976 and 1989 which she co-authored with Thomas. Her current research interests include adaptive sequential design, chemometrics, clinical trials and statistical immunology.
Honors and Awards
- Professor Norm Breslow was awarded Honorary Life
Membership in the International Biometric Society at the XXIII
International Biometrics Conference in Montreal this summer. Norm is
the 16th person to receive this prestigious honor, and the first from
WNAR, since the initial awards to Bliss and Cox in 1964.
- Professors Tim DeRouen, Lianne Sheppard and Jon Wellner were elected Fellows of the American Statistical Association.
- Lianne Sheppard was promoted to Full Professor.
- John Storey was promoted to Associate Professor and assumed a joint appointment with Genome Sciences. John is spending time at Rosetta/Merck this year.
- Peter Hoff was promoted to Associate Professor of Statistics and Biostatistics.
- Professors Patrick Heagerty and Yingye Zheng won an award for the "Best Paper Published in Biometrics" by an IBS member appearing in any of the 2004 or 2005 issues. The paper: "Survival model predictive accuracy and ROC curves," Biometrics 61:92-105.
- Recent graduate Holly Janes (Ph.D. 2005, Pepe) won the ASA Section on Statistics in Epidemiology "Young Investigator Award." Her JSM paper with Professor Margaret Pepe is entitled "The optimal ratio of cases to controls for estimating the classification accuracy of a biomarker."
- Graduate Phillip Dinh (Ph.D. 2006, Zhou) also won an award at JSM—the Section on Health Policy "Student Award" for his paper "Nonparametric statistical methods for a cost-effectiveness analysis" with Professor Andrew Zhou.
- Ph.D. student Leslie Taylor won both the Best Oral Presentation and the Best Paper Award in the student competition at WNAR this June in Flagstaff, AZ.
Congratulations to all!
Recent Graduates
++Sierra Li (Ph.D. 2006, Steve Self advisee) is
currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins University.
++Erica Moodie (Ph.D. 2006, T. Richardson advisee) has
taken a position as Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and
Biostatistics at McGill University in Montreal.
++Pam Shaw (Ph.D. 2006, Ross Prentice advisee) is
currently a Mathematical Statistician with the NIH National Institute of
Allergies and Infectious Diseases.
++Alan Dabney (Ph.D. 2006, John Storey advisee) has
taken a position as Assistant Professor in the Department of Statistics
at Texas A&M University.
++Phil Dinh (Ph.D. 2006, Andrew Zhou advisee) is
working at the Food & Drug Administration, Division of Biometrics
(Silver Spring, MD).
++Umar F. Khan (M.S. 2006, Barbara McKnight and Lyn
Brumback advisee) is a Statistician at the Cystic Fibrosis Therapeutics
Network at Seattle's Children's Hosptial.
++Monica Chaudhari (M.S. 2006, Brian Leroux advisee)
has taken a position with Washington Dental Service.
++Jia Yin "Angel" Wan (M.S. 2006, Stephanie Monks
advisee) is now a Research Statistician at UW Center for Genomics and
Public Health.
++Tessa Colette Rue (M.S. 2006, Brian Leroux advisee)
is currently a Research Scientist in the UW Department of Biostatistics.
++Other recent 2006 masters degree graduates include April
Elizabeth Slee (Paula Diehr advisee, Bo Zhang
(Brian Leroux and Peter Gilbert advisee), Yea-Hung Chen
(Andrew Zhou advisee), Douglas C. Tommet (Gerald van
Belle advisee) and Joseph Rothstein (Ellen Wijsman
advisee).
News Bits
- Dr. King Holmes, longtime director of the UW Center for AIDS and STD and a world leader infectious disease research and training, has been appointed Chair of the new Department of Global Medicine, a joint venture between the School of Public Health and Community Medicine and the School of Medicine. The department was created earlier this year with a $20 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and a substantial commitment from the UW. Read more about it, here.
- Professor Gerald van Belle will deliver the SPHCM Distinguished Faculty Lecture on March 1, 2007.
- Alum Paul Boutin, M.D. (M.S. 1990, Hallstrom) just started the final year of his Child and Adolescent Psychiatry fellowship at Children's Hospital in Seattle, where he will be Chief Fellow this year.
- This past spring, Professor Jim Hughes (Ph.D. 1980, Chapman) used a tablet PC to capture lectures (with voice) in Biostat 513. The lectures were then posted to the Web for students to review. Examples of the new teaching innovation can be found here.
Comings and Goings
- Welcome to Dr. Lon Cardon, who joined our faculty as
Professor WOT. The FHCRC Human Biology Division recently hired Lon, a
computational biologist, who will co-direct the program with PHS
investigator Dr. Robert Gentleman.
- Welcome to Dr. Adam Szpiro, a new postdoctoral fellow working with Dr. Lianne Sheppard on the MESA air project, "Study of Atherosclerosis, Cardiovascular Disease and Exposure to Ambient Particulate Matter," J. Kaufman PI.
- Professor Jon Wakefield is on sabbatical until next September at the International Agency for Research on Cancer, Gene-Environment Epidemiology Group in Lyon, France.
- Farewell to computing head Jim Hogan, who moved to Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences (DEOHS). Congratulations to Brian Haney, who was promoted and is now our new reigning Software Engineer. Welcome also Ryan Kyle from CHSCC, who was reassigned to on-campus administration as Senior Computing Specialist.
- Farewell to student Computing Assistant Shihkai (Shawn) Weng, who graduated from the I-School and moved on. Welcome Nina Yuttapongsontorn, another I-School grad student, who was hired as his replacement.
- Farewell to Postdoctoral Fellow Shuangge Ma, who has left the CHSCC for a new appointment as Assistant Professor at Yale University.
- Longtime CHSCC staffer Jennifer Clark Nelson (Ph.D. 1999, Pepe), who now works at Group Health, has joined the faculty as Affiliate Assistant Professor.
- Welcome Hyoju Chung, who has been appointed at the CHSCC as Senior Fellow.
Milestones
- Grad student Leslie Taylor and her husband Wajih had
a little girl, Noufeesa ("precious" in Arabic) on Friday,
August 25. Noufeesa is pictured left, peeking out from under her
blankie.
- Alum Clemma Jacobsen (M.S. 2002, Yanez) and her husband, Sacha, have a 10 month old son, Adrian Muller. Since Clemma and her family moved to Minneapolis last winter she telecommutes to her job as an analyst with the Center for Clinical and Epidemiological Research (www.uwccer.org). Clemma's coworkers at the center include alums Carolyn Noonan (M.S., 2001, Yanez) and Andy Bogart (M.S. 2005, Heagerty).
- The CHSCC has experienced its very own baby-boom. New parents over the past year (or so) include: Elizabeth Brown, Lyndia Brumback and Steve Daniel (married and both work at the CC), Emily Larsen Marino (M.S. 2000, Hughes), Aruna Kamineni, Robyn McClelland (Ph.D. 2000, Kronmal), Dave Yanez, and students Grace Ge and Sangsoon Woo. John Pearce and his wife are in the process of adopting, and Nick Yasinski and his wife Rachel welcomed their baby girl, Kazimira, on September 25.
- Curriculum Coordinator Alexandra "Alex" MacKenzie successfully completed the UW Certificate Program in Scientific Illustration (June 2006). Her class had an exhibit at the UW Burke Museum of Natural History (through October 8). Alex's artwork may be viewed here.
Alumni Profile
Name: Erica Moodie (pictured at her wedding
with big sister Zoe)
Biostat Degree/Year: Ph.D. 2006 (Thomas Richardson-Stat faculty)
Current Job/Employer: Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and
Epidemiology, University of McGill, Montreal
Favorite book: Elliot Perlman's Seven Types of Ambiguity
the best book I have read in a long while. Currently reading Romeo
Dallaire's Shake Hands With the Devil about the UN, which is
eye-opening.
Personal milestones: I was married on August 16, 2006 to
statistician David Stephens (formerly of the Stats Section of the Math
Department at Imperial College, now in Math & Stats at McGill). Dave is
Jon Wakefield's best friend; we met at my sister's wedding
four years ago. (My older sister, Zoe Moodie (Ph.D.,
2001, Prentice), who works at FHCRC/SCHARP, is married to Biostat Prof
Jon Wakefield.) My mom is a statistician also, so there
are now five statisticians in the Moodie clan, leaving my father, a
biologist, starved for interesting conversation...
Favorite reminiscence about UW days: When I first took a class
from Jon Wakefield, we didn't hide our in-law relationship, nor did we announce
it. However we know each other well
and in class I often laughed before he'd made a joke because I could
knew where his mind was going; this led at least one classmate to
suspect that we were an item!
Fellow alumni are welcome to contact me at: .