Trump wants the U.S. to ramp up production of glyphosate. The MAHA movement is furious. Lianne Sheppard, Professor of Biostatistics and Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences weighs in on the herbicide’s safety.

The central limit theorem started as a bar trick for 18th-century gamblers. Now scientists rely on it every day. Daniela Witten, Professor of Biostatistics and Statistics at the University of Washington, is quoted. 

Infectious disease modeling pioneer helped outline modern precepts for design and analysis of vaccine trials, causal inference with interference; shaped a generation of infectious disease scientists. M. Elizabeth Halloran was a professor with the University of Washington Department of Biostatistics and founder of the Summer Institute in Statistics and Modeling for Infectious Diseases (SISMID).

In this podcast episode Kathleen Kerr, a Professor of Biostatistics at the University of Washington, discusses overdiagnosis and medical decision making. Kerr delves into how patients perceive mammogram results, the difference between overdiagnosis and overcalling, and the challenges pathologists face in diagnosing cancer. She also shares findings from her research on the influence of prior opinions on second diagnoses and the cognitive processes involved in interpreting pathology images. The discussion highlights the complexities and subjectivity in pathology diagnoses and the implications for patient care.

Vibrent Health, a leading software-as-a-service (SaaS) data company in the field of precision medicine research, is collaborating with Fred Hutch Cancer Center on critical correlates of protection research. Peter Gilbert, principle Hutch investigator and University of Washington professor of biostatistics, is quoted: ""This study expands access, enhances flexibility of collecting high-quality data, and accelerates the development of next-generation therapeutics and prevention agents...By identifying and validating correlates of protection, this research not only informs the development of more targeted and effective treatments for infectious diseases but also establishes a framework that can be applied to a wide range of clinical trials, improving outcomes and speeding up the path to approval."

Loneliness has been increasing amongst young people globally, and researchers have been trying to understand why. A study led by researchers at the University of Washington School of Public Health, including UW Biostatistics faculty Kwun Chuen Gary Chan, looked at how youth’s answers to loneliness questions in an international survey have changed from 2000 to 2022.   

Sarah C. Nelson, PhD, a research scientist with the UW Biostatistics Genetics Analysis Center, is co-principal investigator for a group UW researchers examining the ethical and social implications of using legacy datasets in population health research. 

“Compared to contemporary data collections, it’s surprising that a sample of around 1,000 individuals assembled decades ago to primarily study population genetics has become such a gold standard for representing genetic diversity across much of biomedical research,” said Nelson.

Through the Cancer AI Alliance (CAIA), Jeff Leek (MS '07, PhD '09) and his team are seeking to enable AI-supported discovery of cancer treatments. “The goal is to 10x the speed with which a researcher can come up with an idea and have it executed,” says Leek, chief data officer at Fred Hutch Cancer Center.