Department of Statistics Newsletter Fall 2013
The University of Connecticut
Table of Contents
A Message from the Department Head 2 From the Director of the Graduate Program 5 From the Director of the Undergraduate Program 6 Selected Faculty Activities 7 From the Director of the Statistical Consulting Services (SCS) 18 Faculty Awards 20 The 50 th Anniversary Celebration of the Department of Statistics 21 The 23 rd Pfizer Colloquium 24 The 27 th New England Statistics Symposium 29 The 4 th International Workshop in Sequential Methodologies 35 ISBA Regional Meeting and IWCBTA 41 Colloquia 47 Faculty News 48 Alumni News 50 Student News 52 SAMSI Undergraduate Seminar 53 A Birthday Party at JSM 2013 55 Recent Ph.D.’s 56 Recent Masters 56 Recent Bachelors 56 Faculty, Staff and Adjunct Faculty 57 Alumni Reply Form 58
Website address: www.stat.uconn.edu e-mail: [email protected]; Phone: (860) 486-3414, Fax: (860) 486-4113
1 A Message from the Department Head
Welcome to the sixteenth issue of our Department Newsletter . This has been an exciting year for the department on many fronts. On November 1-3, 2012, we celebrated the 50 th Anniversary of the Department. It was a great pleasure to welcome our colleagues, alumni and friends to join us to celebrate this special event. In particular, it was good to have with us Professor Robert Riffenburgh, the founder of the department and its first Department Head. Jointly with the 50 th Anniversary Celebration of the Department, we have held three important events.
The first event being the 23 rd Pfizer Colloquium, co-sponsored by Pfizer, Inc and ASA. The colloquium lecture entitled: “A Pedestrian’s Lost Horizon in the Wiener Wald of Statistical Science,” was presented by Professor Pranab K. Sen, University of North Carolina, and was followed by a conversation with distinguished statisticians, Professors Malay Ghosh, University of Florida, and Dr. George W. Williams, Vice President, Biostatistics and Epidemiology, AMGEN, in memory of Professor Harry Posten. Both the colloquium lecture and the discussion have been filmed for the Archives of ASA. The second event has been the launching of Makuch Visiting Lecture Series in Biostatistics, sponsored by Professor Robert W. Makuch, Yale School of Public Health, Yale University. The inaugural lecture in this series, entitled: “Current Issues in Clinical Trials in Biostatistics,” has been delivered by Professor Robert W. Makuch. The third event in conjunction with our 50 th Anniversary Celebration has been the presentation of our Department’s Distinguished Alumnus Award to Professor E. Jacquelin Dietz, Meredith College. She presented a plenary lecture: “JSE, AP Statistics, and Randomization Tests in Stat 101 – 30 Years of Change in Statistics Education.” Congratulations, Jacquelin, on your academic achievements! Additional information and pictures from the 50th Anniversary celebration of the Department are included in this Newsletter.
We have completed with great success our recruitment processes of three new faculty members. I would like to welcome Dr. Haim Bar and Dr. Kun Chen as Assistant Professors of Statistics, and Dr. Alexander Tartakovsky, as Professor of Statistics. Kun was an Assistant Professor at Kansas State University and Haim was a postdoc and a lecturer at Cornell University, where he received his Ph.D. degree in 2012. Alex was a Research Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Associate Director of the Center for Applied Mathematical Sciences at the University of Southern California.
We would to thank our colleague, Dr. Tung-Lung Wu, who completed a one year Visiting Assistant Professor appointment in our department. Tung-Lung has accepted a postdoc position at Rutgers University. During his visit here, I had the pleasure of collaborating with him on two research articles. We all wish him success in his academic career.
I am happy to let you know that Professor Ming-Hui Chen received the CLAS Excellence in Research Award and the AAUP Excellence in Research Award. Professor Ofer Harel has been Elected Member of International Statistical Institute. Professor Nitis Mukhopadhyay has been elected Fellow of American Association for Advancement of Science. Professor Nalini Ravishanker has been elected to Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering. Our lecturer, Kate McLaughlin, has received the Outstanding Faculty Award, presented by the
2 University of Connecticut Student Support Services. Congratulations to all recipients of these prestigious awards and honors!
Congratulations to Megan Petsa, our Program Assistant, whose appointment became permanent on June 1, 2013. We all are happy to have you in the department.
Our faculty research encompasses all major areas of statistics, including: Applied Probability, Bayesian Analysis, Bioinformatics and Genomics, Biostatistics, Financial statistics, Time Series Analysis and various aspects of Mathematical Statistics and Probability Theory. I am proud to mention that seven of our current faculty, one emeritus professor, are fellows of the ASA, seven of our current faculty and one emeritus faculty are fellows of the IMS, two of our faculty are fellows of AAAS and three of our current faculty are elected members of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences or Sciences and Engineering. Our faculty members continue to hold prestigious editorial and editorial board positions in major journals in probability and statistics.
The research initiatives and the quality of output of the department continue to soar. We enjoy research funding from a variety of sources including NSF, NIH and private companies. International and national visibility of the department also continues to grow with our faculty’s participation and visits at conferences and other universities all over the world. We have also developed a strong interdisciplinary research program within UConn. Recently we have received high ranks in NRC as well as US News and World News.
We have been fortunate continually to receive support from our alumni. We have recently received three major donations for the department through the CLAS Foundation Office. We have received a gift from the estate of Elizabeth Macfarlane, CLAS ’39, of about $400,000 to support graduate students who pursue a graduate degree in Biostatistics. We have also received from Professor Robert Makuch, CLAS ’72, who is currently a faculty member at the School of Public Health, Yale University, a generous gift of $25,000 to establish a distinguished lecture series in the field of Biostatistics.
We also received a generous gift of $25,000 from Professor Matthew Goldstein, Ph.D. 1970, Chancellor Emeritus, CUNY, to establish a fund to support graduate education. Our alumnus, Chancellor Goldstein, has been having an illustrious academic career, culminating with a 14 year Chancellorship at CUNY, a university comprised of 24 colleges and professional schools with 490,000 students. To quote former President of Yale University and Chairman of Board of Trusties of CUNY, Benno Schmidt: “Chancellor Goldstein has led the unprecedented transformation of CUNY into the premiere integrated urban university in America. By all indications, CUNY’s outstanding reputation, rising enrollments, increased standards and enhanced resources should be attributed in large measure to his exemplary and courageous leadership.” Chancellor Goldstein received many prestigious awards: he is Elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and recipient of the prestigious Carnegie Corporation of New York’s Academic Leadership Award. Congratulations Matt on your distinguished career in Science and Education! We are all proud to have you as our alumnus and are grateful for your continual support of the department. We wish you great success in all your future endeavors.
These generous gifts to the department, from all our alumni, will strengthen our department’s research and graduate programs in Statistics and Biostatistics. I am grateful to Becky McEnery,
3 Linda Mullarkey and Maria Quiray Lawrence from CLAS Development Office for their support and guidance.
I am grateful for the support our department has been receiving from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the University. The five new faculty positions that have been allocated to our department in the last two years will continue to strengthen research, undergraduate and graduate programs and enhance our department national and international standing.
I am confident that the new Research Center for Jackson Labs, the Bioscience initiative at UCHC, as well as the possibility of establishing a School of Public Health, and the Next Generation STEM initiatives, will serve as an attraction for top applicants in statistics and biostatistics for our future faculty positions. The establishment of a Techno Park will also serve as an attraction for top applicants in Applied Statistics, as the new faculty members will have the opportunity to interact on research project with scientists at this new research facility.
The faculty members in our department continue vigorously to develop and maintain collaborative research programs with colleagues from other departments and research centers within the university and scientists at other universities and research institutes in the US and abroad. Within the university, we maintain strong ties with Chemistry, Civil Engineering, Computer Science, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Electrical Engineering, Finance, Geography, Mathematics, Molecular and Cell Biology, Nutrition, Pathobiology, Pharmacy, Psychiatry and Natural Resources Management departments. We are committed to strengthening our interdisciplinary research component. Faculty members and graduate students from Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Computer Science and from Statistics meet regularly to further collaborative research on Statistical Genetics. Faculty from Genetics and Developmental Biology at UCHC, Computer Science, and Statistics meet periodically for collaborative research in Bioinformatics. Some faculty members are also involved with various interdisciplinary programs within the university, including the Center for Public Health and Health Policy
The internship programs with the UConn Health Center are flourishing and our students continue to enjoy the practical experience we offer them. The UConn Health Center has continued to support our students both from joint research grants as well as from internship programs. We thank Professor James Grady at the Health Center and Professor Rob Aseltine from the Institute of Public Health Research for their continued support during the past year. We are also enjoying close research collaboration with the Center of Health and Information Policy (CHIP). With the hire of Elizabeth Schifano and her appointment at CHIP, we have the opportunity to strengthen even further our research collaborations with one of the most active research centers at the university. I am looking forward to continue working jointly with Professor Jeff Fisher, Director of CHIP, to develop additional joint research initiatives.
We are developing numerous research projects through our Statistical Consulting Services (SCS). Professor Ming-Hui Chen is continuing with great success as the Director of the Statistical Consulting Services. Currently several graduate students are being supported through the SCS. One of our major clients is CHIP. The list of clients is quite impressive and continues to grow. We are grateful for the financial support we receive for our SCS from the Office of Vice President for Research, and Professor Jeremy Teitelbaum, Dean of CLAS.
4 We are continuing to be active University affiliates of NISS and SAMSI. Our faculty, graduate and undergraduate students are actively participating in programs at NISS and SAMSI.
The Pfizer Global Research & Development Student Fellowship Program has been extended to another year. Our Department and the Global Research & Development of Pfizer Inc. signed a joint agreement of the continuation of this Fellowship program. We are grateful to Pfizer for their continual support and are looking forward to further collaborations.
Our graduate and undergraduate programs continue to expand. Currently we have 97 graduate students and close to 100 undergraduate students majoring in statistics. We have started an MS program with concentration in Biostatistics and are planning to start a Professional MS degree in Biostatistics. A committee chaired by Professor Lynn Kuo has developed an application to the Vice Provost Office for a new Professional MS degree in Biostatistics, which we are planning to submit by the end of the academic year 2013/14. This new program offers a great opportunity for the department, CLAS and the University at large, as it will play a major role in the economic development program of the State of Connecticut. Graduates from this program can be employed by pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies, Jackson Labs and UCHC.
I am proud of our department accomplishments and would like to thank our faculty, staff, alumni, graduate students and professional friends for their commitment to the department.
Joseph Glaz (Phone: (860)486-4196; e-mail: [email protected])
From the Director of the GGGraduateGraduate Program
The graduate programs offered by our department continue to be of high quality. We offer a broad spectrum of modern courses in statistics and probability, including statistical computing and consulting. In the advanced seminar courses, the students are exposed to exciting areas of current research. Through the Statistical Consulting Services, the students are engaged in research in many areas of science and technology and provide support to the research community of the University of Connecticut. We have an extensive collaboration with faculty members in medical, health and environmental sciences, and our graduate students have the opportunity to be employed as research assistants on many of their funded research projects.
Last academic year, 35 students were admitted to our graduate program, 11 of them being supported by the department and a variety of other sources. A total of 99 graduate students were enrolled in our MS and Ph.D. programs, out of which 28 were supported by teaching or research assistantships. Cigna Corporation is providing financial support for research projects for three of the graduate students who received assistantships.
This year over 434 students all over the world applied for admission to our graduate programs. I would like to thank the members of the graduate admission committee: Professors
5 Pozdnyakov (Director of Graduate Admissions), Kuo, Ravishanker, Vitale, Yan, for their hard work in reviewing the applications. Thanks are also due to our administrative staff: Megan Petsa and Tracy Burke, for their hard work throughout the application and admission processes. This Fall 2013 semester, our incoming class will include 35 new students, 26 in the MS program and 9 in the Ph.D. program, with all the new Ph.D. students being supported by the department.
An updated Graduate Brochure, providing information about the department, our graduate programs and application forms along with instructions, is available on the department website: www.stat.uconn.edu
Zhiyi Chi (e-mail: [email protected])
From the Director of the Undergraduate Program
The Undergraduate Program continues to grow steadily, and we now have over 90 majors in Statistics and Mathematics-Statistics, an increasing number of them being Honors students. Our courses at the Undergraduate level are in very high demand, as many students as UConn wish to incorporate statistics into their major or minor plan of study or coursework. Our majors continue to explore and benefit from courses such as Field Study Internship and Undergraduate Research. Two students, James Anderson and Lilian Cheung enjoyed the experience of attending one or more SAMSI Undergraduate workshops. Our students continue to be accepted to leading graduate programs in the country.
The Department offered STAT 2215 as an online course for the second time in Summer 2013. We are also happy to report that the Early College Experience (ECE) program, which provides an interaction between UConn and Connecticut high schools, continues as a healthy outreach activity.
Please see the department website: www.stat.uconn.edu for the undergraduate brochure, information about our undergraduate program, and information for our majors and minors.
We congratulate all our majors graduating between December 2012 and August 2013, and we wish them success in all their future endeavors.
Nalini Ravishanker (Phone: (860)486-4760; e-mail: [email protected])
6
Selected Faculty Activities
Editorial Boards
MingMingMing-Ming ---HuiHui Chen is Editor of Bayesian Analysis , Nalini RavishanRavishankerkerkerker continues to serve as Editor, Associate Editor of Journal of the American Statistical Theory and Methods for the Applied Stochastic Models Association , Associate Editor of Lifetime Data Analysis , in Business and Industry (ASMBI) and as an Associate Associate Editor of Journal of Computational and Editor of the Journal of Forecasting. Graphical Statistics , and Associate Editor of Statistics and Its Interface . He is a Co-Guest Editor of Statistics Alexander Tartakovsky is the Associate Editor of the Sinica for a Special Issue on Spatial and Temporal Data Sequential Analysis Journal and Sequential Methodology. Analysis and Guest Editor of Statistics and Its Interface for a Special Issue on Modern Bayesian Statistics. Rick Vitale continues to serve on the editorial board
of Methodology and Computing in Applied Probability. Dipak K. Dey is an Invited Guest Editor for the special issue on Spatial Statistics with Sudipto Banerjee Jun Yun is serving as Editor-in-chief, International for the journal Statistical Methodology . Chinese Statistical Association Bulletin , January 2011-
December 2013. Joseph Glaz is Editor-in-Chief of Methodology and Computing in Applied Probability. He is also Associate Selected Invited Editor of Sequential Analysis. He has signed a contract to edit, jointly with Professor Markos Koutras, Faculty Talks University of Piraeus, Greece, a two volume Handbook on Scan Statistics , to be published by Springer. Haim Bar presented an invited talk at the ICSA Applied Statistics Symposium in New York City, NY, in Ofer Harel is an Associate Editor for Statistics in June 2011. He was also an invited speaker at the Medicine and on the Editorial Board of The Open Department of Statistics at Cornell University, NY, in Medical Informatics Journal and AIDS and Behavior. November 2013; the Department of Statistics at the University of Rochester, NY, in February 2013; and at the Department of Biostatistics at the University of Nitis Mukhopadhyay is the Editor-in-Chief of Iowa in March 2013. Sequential Analysis (since 2004), and an Invited Guest
Editor for the Sri Lankan Journal of Applied Statistics (SLJAS ). He is a member of the Advisory Board for KunKunKun ChenChenChen gave an invited colloquium at the SLJAS and Associate Editors of the Communications in Department of Biostatistics, Brown University, Statistics, Statistical Methodology, and Calcutta Providence, RI in September 2013. He presented invited Statistical Association Bulletin . talks at the College of Mathematics and Software, Sichuan Normal Univeristy, Chengdu, China in July 2013. He also gave invited talks at the Department of Vladimir Pozdnyakov is an Associate Editor of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of Iowa, Iowa Journal of Mathematical Analysis and Applications . City, IA in November 2012 and at the Department of
7 Mathematics, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS in “Bayesian Design of Non-Inferiority Clinical Trials Using April 2012. Historical Data with Applications”, at the FDA/CDRH/OSB/Division of Biostatistics, U.S. Food and MingMingMing-Ming ---HuiHui Chen was an invited speaker in an invited Drug Administration, Silver Spring, Maryland, June 12, session on `“Bayesian Clinical Trial Application” at The 2013; “Power Priors for Incorporating Historical Data Second Joint Biostatistics Symposium, Renmin University with Applications” at the School of Finance and of China, Beijing, China, July 8-9, 2012; an invited Statistics, East China Normal University, Shanghai, speaker in a SBSS Topic Contributed Session on China, June 25, 2013; “Bayesian Parametric, “Bayesian Modeling: Application in Clinical Trial Design Semiparametric, Frailty, and Cure Rate Models for and Analysis" at the 2012 JSM, San Diego, CA, July 30- Survival Data” in the 2013 Zhejiang University August 2, 2012; an invited speaker in an invited Probability and Statistics Summer Workshop, session on “Design of Clinical Trials for Time-to-Event Department of Mathematics, Zhejiang University, Data" at The 2013 Spring Meeting of the International Hangzhou, China, June 27, 2013; “Bayesian Design of Biometric Society, Eastern North American Region Non-Inferiority Clinical Trials” at the Department of (ENAR), Orlando, FL, March 13, 2013; an invited Mathematics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, speaker at the Eleventh Annual ASA Connecticut China, July 1, 2013; and “Bayesian Design of Non- Chapter Mini-Conference, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Inferiority Trials using Historical Data via Power Priors” Wallingford, CT, March 27, 2013; an invited speaker at at the Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. at DIMACS Workshop on Analysis of Information from Shanghai, China, July 5, 2013. Diverse Sources, DIMACS Center, CoRE Building, Rutgers University, NJ, May 16-17, 2013; and an invited Dipak K. Dey was a plenary speaker at the 20 th speaker in the Jiann-Ping Hsu Invited Session on Brazilian Statistical Association meeting in Joao Pessoa, Biostatistical and Regulatory Sciences at the 2013 Brazil, July 2012. He presented an invited talk at the ICSA/ISBS Joint Statistical Conference, Bethesda, International Chinese Statistical Association meeting, Maryland, June 9-12, 2013. He also delivered invited Boston, MA, Department of Statistics, Campinas State talks or lectures or workshops on “Bayesian Gamma University, Campinas, Brazil, August 2012; Department Frailty Models for Survival Data with Semi-Competing of Statistics, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Bello Risks and Treatment Switching” at School of Public Horizonte, Brazil, August 2012; Department of Health and Family Medicine, Capital Medical University, Statistics, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, August 2012; Beijing, China, July 10, 2012; “Monte Carlo Methods in invited speaker at the symposium on Non-Gaussian Bayesian Computation” at the Center for Statistical Multivariate Statistical Models and Their Applications, Science, Peking University, Beijing, China, July 11, Banff International Research Station, Banff, Canada; and 2012; “Bayesian Inference of Cox Model with Gamma at the First Latin American Symposium in Bayesian Process Priors in Presence of Ties” at the Institute of Statistics, sponsored by ISBA, at the University of Costa Computational Mathematics, Academy of Mathematics & Rica, July 2013 and an invited talk at the Joint Systems Science (AMSS), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Statistical Meeting in Montreal, Canada, August 2013. Beijing, China, July 12, 2012; “Bayesian Analysis of Survival Data with Semi-Competing Risks and Treatment Joseph Glaz presented a plenary lecture at the Switching” at the Department of Statistics, University of International Symposium on Applied Stochastic Models South Carolina, SC, October 11, 2012; “Bayesian Design and Data Analysis – ASMDA 2013, Barcelona, Spain, of Non-Inferiority Clinical Trials Using Historical Data” June 25-28, 2013. at the Department of Biostatistics, UT M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, October 22, 2012;
8 Ofer Harel presented invited talks at the Statistical NESS held at UConn-Storrs in April 2013. He attended Center for HIV/AIDS Research and Prevention (SCHARP), the Joint Statistical Meetings in Montreal, Canada, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA, August 2013 and will present two invited colloquia in July 2012; the Biostatistics Department, Brown the Department of Statistics at Columbia University-New University, Providence, RI, October 2012; the York in September 2013. He is organizer and chair for Biostatistics Department, Yale University, New Haven, three invited paper sessions and a member of its CT, October 2012; the Army Conference on Applied International Program Committee for the IWAP to be Statistics (ACAS), Monterey, CA, October 2012; the held in Turkey in June 2014. More than six hours of Finance Department, University of Connecticut, Storrs, research seminars will be delivered in November 2013 CT, March 2013; the Department of Statistics, University at the Department of Statistics, University of Calcutta, of Haifa, Haifa, Israel, June 2013; the Department of India to celebrate the International Year of Statistics. Statistics at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, He is Co-Chair for the international conference, Jerusalem, Israel, June 2013; and the Statistics Seminar “Statistical Concepts and Methods for the Modern Tel-Aviv University; Tel-Aviv, Israel, June 2013. World,” organized by the Applied Statistical Association of Sri Lanka, Colombo, December 2014. Lynn Kuo gave an invited colloquium, “Nonparametric Bayesian Inference with Applications to Biostatistics,” Vladimir Pozdnyakov presented “Asymptotics of a on March 22, 2013 at the Department of Biostatistics, Clustering Criterion for Smooth Distributions” at the University of Kentucky. International Conference on Robust Statistics (ICORS 2013) in Saint Petersburg, Russia, July 2013. He also presented “Repeated Significance Tests in Presence of Nitis Mukhopadhyay organized and chaired three Random Costs” at the New England Statistical invited paper sessions on the interface of sequential Symposium, April 2010, at Harvard University in methodologies and applied probability during the Cambridge, Massachusetts. International Workshop in Applied Probability (IWAP) held in Jerusalem, Israel, June 2012. He presented an Nalini Ravishanker presented invited talks on “Fast invited paper in a colloquium organized by the Computational Approaches for Predictive Inference for Department of Mathematics, Utah Valley University, Time Correlated Data Stream” at the SAMSI November 2012; an invited paper at the 8 th Calcutta Computational Workshop; on “Dynamic Models for Time Triennial Statistics Symposium held in Calcutta, India, Series of Counts, with Applications” at the International December 2012; and another invited paper at the Joint Workshop on New Advances in Statistics, University of Statistical Conference of IISA held in Chennai, India, Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada, at the IISA 2013 in January 2013. He co-chaired the entire 8 th Calcutta Chennai, India, and at the University of North Carolina Triennial Statistics Symposium and organized and at Greensboro; and on “Temporal Dynamics of chaired a number of sessions there in December 2012. Gastropod Abundance in a Tropical Forest: Bayesian He presented two invited papers in the colloquia series Framework” at SRCOS 2013, Montgomery Bell State organized by the Department of Biostatistics and Park, Burns, TN. She presented a talk on “Introduction Epidemiology, George Regents University-Augusta, July to Statistics and Research” at the Research and 2013; and co-chaired the 4 th International Workshop in Innovation Colloquia, M.O.P. Vaishnav College for Sequential Methodologies (IWSM) hosted by the Women, Chennai, India and a talk on “Dynamic Models Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia- for Stochastic Volatility” in the Valparaiso Experience in Athens in July 2013. He organized and chaired (i) a Research by Undergraduate Mathematicians (VERUM), number of invited paper sessions during the IWSM in Valparaiso University. July 2013 and (ii) an invited paper sessions during 9 Elizabeth Schifano presented invited talks at the in April 2013 with co-instructor Marcos Prates; and International Chinese Statistical Association Symposium, “Introduction to Copula Modeling with R” at the Bethesda, MD, June 2013 and at the Modern Modeling Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil in Methods Conference, University of Connecticut, Storrs, November 2012. CT, May 2013. She was also an invited speaker at the Department of Biostatistics & Computational Biology, Grants University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, November 2012 and at the Department of Biostatistics, Johns Hopkins KunKunKun ChenChenChen is the PI on the subcontract of an NIH School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, September U01 grant, “An integrative statistics-guided image-based 2012. multi-scale lung model” for 2013-2018.
Alexander Tartakovsky was a plenary speaker at the Ming-Ming -HuiHui Chen is the PI on the subcontract of an th MingMing --Hui Chen 4 International Workshop in Sequential Methodologies NIH R01 grant for 2011-2015. He is the Co-PI on an in Athens, Georgia in July 2013; the Conference on NIH R01 grant on “Metabolomics Tools for Stochastic Optimization and Optimal Stopping in Biomedicine” for 2010-2014. He serves as the Moscow, Russia in September 2012; and the Biostatistician in an NIH grant for 2012-2014. He is a International Workshop on Sequential Methods and Co-PI of the Diet and Health Initiative (DHI) grant for Their Applications at the University of Rouen in France, th 2012-2014 and a Co-PI of the Seed Grant Development June 2012. He also presented an invited talk at the 6 Opportunities for CHIP Principal Investigators for 2012- European Congress of Mathematics in Krakow, Poland 2013. He is a PI on the subcontract from UNC of in July 2012. Merck & Co. Grant on “Bayesian Methods for Clinical Trials” for 2013-2014. He is also a statistical analyst Xiaojing Wang presented invited talks at the ICSA- working with Joseph G. Ibrahim (PI) for Eli Lilly’s ISBS Joint Statistics Conference in Bethesda, MD, June project on joint modeling of longitudinal and survival 2013; Modern Modeling Methods Conference, University data, Merck’s projects on meta analysis, Amgen’s of Connecticut in May 2013; Eastern North American projects on survival models with semi-competing risks Region (ENAR) Spring Meeting in Orlando, FL, March and the Bayesian trial designs using meta-analytic 2013; Department of Statistics, Remin University of survival models, and Novartis’s project on missing data China in Beijing, China, December 2012. models for informative treatment switching or dropout.
Jun Yan presented “Statistics methods and computing Dipak K. Dey is Co-PI with M. Lynes from MCB on a for semiparametric accelerated failure time models with NIH grant entitled, “Protein Microarray System for induced smoothing” at the Department of Biostatistics, Rheumatoid Arthritis”, from 2010-2012. He is also Brown Univerisity, May 2013. He presented Co-PI with James Rusling from Chemistry on a NIH “Transformed Gaussian Markov random fields and SBIR grant entitled, “Protein Biosensor Arrays based on Spatial Modeling” at both the Universidade Federal de Nanomaterials”, 2011-2015. He received the training Minas Gerais, Brazil in November 2012 and at the grant with Jeremy Teitelbaum from Cigna Healthcare to Department of Biostatistics, University of Massachusetts- form an analytics center to support graduate students Amherst in October 2012. He also taught two short from Statistics, Mathematics and Psychology. He also courses: “Statistical Analysis of Spatial Data and obtained a training grant from Cigna Health Care to Visualization with Google Map” at the University of support six graduate students. Connecticut, The 27 th New England Statistics Symposium
10 Ofer HarHarelelelel is a PI on “Dealing with missing data in “Investigation of Road and Roadside Design Elements HIV prevention trials,” a grant supported by the Associated with Elderly Pedestrian Safety” (August National Institute of Health, Co-PI on “Multilevel 2012-December 2013) funded by New England Alcohol-HIV/AIDS Prevention in South Africa” supported University Transportation Center (USDOT); “Effectiveness by the National Institute of Health, and Co-PI on of Interventions at Midblock Crossings for Improving “Proactive primary dementia care for patients and Senior and Other Pedestrian Safety” (2013-2014) families” supported by the National Institute of Health. funded by Center for Transportation and Livable He is also a Biostatistician on “Effectiveness of an IMB- Systems; and “Statistical Modeling of Highway Crash based intervention for Reducing Sweetened Beverage Severity: a Multi-stage Hierarchical Bayesian Multiple- Consumption in Preschool Children” grant from the Response Framework (2013-2014), a UConn Faculty United States Department of Agriculture; “Characteristics Large Grant. She is PI on a grant to NSF/MPS: “2013 of Effective Job Health and Safety Committees” and International Conference on Statistics, Science and “Aging, Musculoskeletal Disorders and Work Capacity” Society: New Challenges and Opportunities (September grants from the National Institute of Health. Ofer Harel 2012-August 2013). also has several sub-contracts from UCHC to fund a number of students. Elizabeth Schifano is the PI on a Large Faculty Grant entitled “Statistical Methods for High Dimensional Sangwook Kang is continuing to be the PI on the Data,” July 1, 2013-June 30, 2014. She was also the subcontract of an NIH R01 grant, “Using the Scientific PI on a subcontract from the Connecticut Children’s CV to Study the Effects of Interventions on Research Medical Center through the Connecticut Department of Careers,” for 2010 – 2014. He is also a Co-PI with Public Health to study proper diagnosis of asthma Jun Yan (PI) of an NSF grant “Statistical Inferences, severity in children. Computing, and Applications of Semiparametric Accelerated Failure Time Models” for 2012 – 2015. Alexander Tartakovsky is the PI on “General Multidecision Theory: Hypothesis Testing and Lynn Kuo is a Co-PI of the grant, “Characterization of Changepoint Detection-Classification with Applications to Novel Pathways Involved in Mediating Plant-Derived Homeland Security,” ARO (4/1/13-5/31/16); PI on Molecule Inhibition of Staphylococcus Arueus Infection “Collaborative Research: ATD: Advanced Quickest of Bovine Mammary Gland” with Kristen Govoni, Multidecision Change Detection-Classification Methods for supported by USDA/NIFA. Threat Assessment in Distributed Sensing Systems,” NSF (9/1/12-8/31/15); Co-PI on “Situational Awareness for Social Media: Theories, Models and Algorithms,” DARPA Nitis Mukhopadhyay received travel grants from (12/15/11-12/14-15); PI on “Adaptive Spatiotemporal UCRF-AAUP and Taylor & Francis to partially fund in Image Processing-Based Clutter Suppression and connection with his invited trips to IWAP 2013 in Nonlinear Filtering-Based Track-Before-Detect Techniques Jerusalem, Israel; Calcutta Triennial 2012 in India; 4 th for Tracking Closely-Spaced Dim Objects,” MDA IWSM 2013 at the University of Georgia-Athens; IISA (8/31/11-8/30/14); PI on “Nonlinear Filtering and 2013 in Chennai, India. Additional funding came from Change-Point Detection Methods for Course of Action Georgia Regents University-Augusta and University of Analysis, Defense Threat Reduction Agency,” DTRA Georgia-Athens. (7/1/10-6/30/15); and Co-PI on “Inferring Structure
and Forecasting Dynamics on Evolving Networks,” is Co-PI with John Ivan from Civil Nalini RaviRavishankershanker AFOSR-MURI (10/1/10-9/30/15). and Environmental Engineering on three grants,
11 Xiaojing Wang is a PI on the Faculty Large Grants Co-Organizer of the Banff International Research Station Award, with the research topic focusing on “A Bayesian Workshop on Statistical and Computational Theory and Analysis of Dynamic Item Response Models with Methodology for Big Data Analysis (2013-2014). Application to Adaptive Measurement Testing,” 01/01/2013-12/31/2013. Dipak K. Dey is a Member, Accreditation Implementation Committee of the American Statistical Jun Yan was awarded by NSF DMS1209022, Association, 2010-present, COPSS Presidents’ Award 07/01/2012—06/30/2015: Statistical Inferences, Committee, 2010-2012 and is the chair of the Computing, and Applications for Semiparametric International advisory board of the ISBA meeting in Accelerated Failure Time Models. $130,000. PI: Jun Yan. Varanasi, India. At UConn, he is a member of Research Co-PI: Sangwook Kang. And from the University of Advisory Council, Associate Director, Connecticut Institite Wisconsin (NIH RO1 subcontract, PI: Hui-Chuan Lai), of Clinical and Translational Sciences (CICATS), Executive 09/01/2011. 08/31/2016: Newborn Screening, committee of the Tech Park, Core Research Group of Malnutrition and Lung Disease in Children with Cystiv the Center for Health Communication and Marketing, Fibrosis. $37,284. PI: Jun Yan. Advisory Committee of the Center for Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Selection committee for the OOOutreachOutreach Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor, 2010-2012. He is a Fellow, Institute for Public Health Research. He is a member/chair of various Search Committees, MingMingMing-Ming ---HuiHui Chen is President-Elect (2012), President including Director of the Institute of Materials Science (2013), and President-Past (2014) of the International and Heads of the Departments of Physics and Chinese Statistical Association (ICSA, elected in 2011), a Geography. He organized various faculty development member of the Board of Directors, Zhejiang University workshops and arranged mock panels to evaluate grant Alumni Association (elected in 2011), and a member of proposals at UConn, which lead to successful funding of the Board of Directors, International Society for the first IGERT grant at UConn. He is a member of the Bayesian Analysis, (elected in 2010 and serving for Hong Kong Research Grant Council, Kuwait Research 2011-2013). He served on the Scientific Committee of Foundation and Estonian Research Foundation. Recently, the ISBA 2012 World Meeting, which was held in he served as an external evaluator for the Department Kyoto, Japan, June 25-29, 2012. He was a member of of Statistics, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL the Section on Bayesian Statistical Sciences (SBSS) and Department of Mathematical Sciences, Indiana Committee on Nominations (2009-2012). He was a University, Purdue University, Indianapolis, IN. member of the executive committee of the 2012 ICSA Annual Applied Statistics Symposium. He is an Adjunct Joseph Glaz served on the Scientific Program Faculty in the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health Committee of the International Symposium on Applied at Georgia Southern University (2007-Present, Stochastic Models and Data Analysis, ASMDA 2013, http://jphcoph.georgiasouthern.edu/faculty/directory/adju Barcelona, Spain, June 2013. He is a member of the nct). He is an active Biostatistics reviewer for the International Board of the International Workshop in Journal of Clinical Oncology . He was also a reviewer of Applied Probability, IWAP 2014, Antalya, Turkey, June the National Security Agency (NSA) grant proposal, 2014. He is a member of the oversight committee for 2012; the grant proposal of the Division for Social an undergraduate minor in bioinformatics. He is also Science, Netherlands ORganisation for Scientific Research an affiliated faculty with Applied Genomics Signature (NOW), 2013; and the grant proposal of the Research Program, Center for Applied Genetics and Technology, Grant Council (RGC) of Hong Kong, 2013. He is also a
12 and with Booth Engineering Center for Advanced Distinguished Statisticians” for the archives of the Technology (BECATS). American Statistical Association (2002-present); and the Guest Editor for two full issues (2013) of the Sri Ofer Harel is a Council of Chapters Representative, Lankan Journal of Applied Statistics that is brought out Connecticut Chapter, the American Statistical by the Institute of Applied Statistics Sri Lanka (IASSL). Association; Program Chair of the Health Policy Statistics Section (HPSS), the American Statistical Nalini Ravishanker serves as the Chair of the Association. He is on the scientific organizing Publications Committee of the International Statistics committee for The International Conference for Health Institute (ISI), and has been elected as the VP for the Policy Statistics (ICHPS); an elected member of the Scientific Program at ISBIS (2013-2015). She is a Statistics Section Council of the American Public Health Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA). Association (APHA); and an elected member of the She continues to serve as faculty coordinator for Council of Sections, Health Policy Statistics Sections, the Statistics in the UConn Early College Experience (ECE) American Statistical Association. program, and also serves on its Advisory Committee.
Lynn Kuo is a core member of the bioinformatics Alexander Tartakovsky is a Member of the SIAM group and a member of the University of Connecticut Activity Group on Uncertainty Quantification (2011- Stem Cell Institute. She was the treasurer of the present). He has been a co-organizer of several International Chinese Statistical Association (ICSA), from conferences, in particular the Third International 2009-2012, and now she maintains the J. P. Hsu Workshop in Sequential Methodologies, Stanford scholarship fund and serves as an advisor to the University, Palo Alto, CA, 2011; the Conference on treasurer and symposium treasurer of ICSA. She Markov and Semi-Markov Processes and Related Fields, organized and chaired an invited paper session, Porto Carras, Greece, 2011; the International Workshop “Recent Advances in Genomics,” for the 2013 ICSA/ISBS of Sequential Methods and Their Applications, Rouen, Joint Statistical Conference in Washington, D.C. In this France, 2012. He has also been an organizer of invited session, she invited Ziwen Wei from Merck & Co., Inc., sessions for many conferences, including IWSM, IWAP, Zhengqing Ouyang from the Jackson Laboratory for and Fusion. He is also the Guest Editor of the Special Genomic Medicine, Elizabeth Schifano from our Issues “Celebrating the Seventy-Fifth Birthday of Albert department, and Ruzong Fan from NICHD/NIH as N. Shiryaev,” Sequential Analysis , vol. 29, 2010; speakers. She was a member of the Review Board for “Selected Papers from IWSM 2011,” Sequential Analysis , papers submitted for Student Travel Awards for the vol. 31, 2012; and the Special Invited Discussion Paper 27 th New England Statistical Symposium. by David Siegmund “Change-points: From Sequential Detection to Biology and Back,” (with six discussion Nitis Mukhopadhyay is the Vice-President, Calcutta pieces), Sequential Analysis , vol. 32, 2013. Statistical Association (2013) and a Member of the Council, Calcutta Statistical Association (2010-present). Xiaojing Wang is a Member of ICSA Membership He is Co-Chair for the international conference, Committee, 2013-2015. “Statistical Concepts and Methods for the Modern World,” organized by the Applied Statistical Association Jun Yan was a review panelist for the Statistics of Sri Lanka, Colombo (December 2014). A member, Program, Division of Mathematical Sciences, of the Committee on ASA Archives and Historical Materials of National Science Foundation, February 2013. the American Statistical Association (2010-present);
Chair for the National Committee on “Filming of
13 Selected Publications MingMingMing-Ming ---HuiHui Chen (With Zhang, Y., Ibrahim, J.G., Zeng, D., Chen, Q., Pan, Z., and Xue, X.) 2013. Bayesian Haim Bar (With Jiang et al.) 2013. A higher maternal Gamma Frailty Models for Survival Data with Semi- choline intake among third-trimester pregnant women Competing Risks and Treatment Switching. Lifetime lowers placental and circulating concentrations of the Data Analysis , 19. DOI: 10.1007/s10985-013-9254-8. antiangiogenic factor fms-like tyrosine kinase-1 (sFLT1). The FASEB Journal , 27:1245-1253; doi:10.1096/fj.12- (With de Castro, M., Ibrahim, J.G., and Klein, J.P.) 221648. 2013. Bayesian Transformation Models for Multivariate Survival Data. Scandinavian Journal of Statistics . DOI: (With J. Booth and M. Wells) 2012. A Mixture-Model 10.1111/sjos.12010. Approach for Parallel Testing for Unequal Variances. Statistical Applications in Genetics and Molecular (With Ge, M.) (2012). Bayesian Inference of the Fully Biology , Vol. 11, Iss. 1, Article 8. Specified Subdistribution Model for Survival Data with Competing Risks. Lifetime Data Analysis , 18(3), 339- (With D. Lillard) 2012. Accounting for Heaping in 363. Retrospectively Reported Event Data – A Mixture Model Approach. Statistics in Medicine , DOI: (With Ibrahim, J.G., Xia, H.A., and Liu, T.) (2012). 10:1002/sim.5419. Bayesian Meta-Experimental Design: Evaluating Cardiovascular Risk in New Antidiabetic Therapies to (With Rosenbaum et al.) 2012. Transcriptional analysis Treat Type 2 Diabetes. Biometrics , 68(2), 578-586. of Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 with an electrode compared to soluble Fe(111) or oxygen as terminal Zhiyi Chi (With C. Guan, P. B. Luh, and L. D. Michel) electron acceptor. PLoS ONE , 7(2):e30827. 2013. Hybrid Kalman filters for short-term load forecasting and prediction interval estimation. IEEE Trans. Power Systems, in press. KunKunKun ChenChenChen (With Dong, H. and Chan, K.-S.) 2013.
Reduced rank regression via adaptive nuclear norm 2012. On exact sampling of nonnegative infinitely penalization. Biometrika. In press. divisible random variables Adv. Appl. Probab. 44(3).
842-873. (With Shi, J. and Song, W.) 2013. Robust errors-in- variables linear regression via Laplace distribution. 2011. Effects of statistical dependence on multiple Statistics and Probability Letters . In press. testing under a hidden Markov model. Ann. Statist.
39(1), 439-473. (With Stenseth, N.C. and Chan, K.-S.) 2012. Reduced rank stochastic regression with a sparse singular value 2010. Multiple hypothesis testing on composite nulls decomposition. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society : using constrained p-values. Electronic J. Statist. 4, 271- Series B. Vol. 74, No. 2, 203-221. 299.
(With Chan, K.-S.) 2011. Subset ARMA model selection Dipak K. Dey (With X. Jiang, R. Pruneir, A. Wilson via the adaptive lasso. Statistics and Its Interface . Vol. Dipak K. Dey 4, 197-205. and K. Holsinger) 2013. A new class flexible link functions with application to species co-occurrence in
14 cape floristic region. Annals of Applied Statistics , in press. (With Boyko, J.) 2013. Missing data: Should we care? The American Journal of Public Health , 103(2), 200- (With W. Li and C. Zhang) 2013. Modeling 201. experimental cross transiograms of neighboring (With Siddique, J. and Crespi, C.M.) 2012. Addressing landscape categories with the gamma distribution. The missing data mechanism uncertainty using multiple- International Journal of Geographical Information model multiple imputation: application to a longitudinal Science , 26:4, 599-620. clinical trial. Annals of Applied Statistics , 6(4), 1814- 1837. (With S. Tchumtchoua). 2012. Modeling Associations among Multivariate Longitudinal Categorical Variables (With Schafer, J.L.) 2009. Partial and latent ignorability in Survey Data: a Semiparametric Bayesian Approach. in missing-data problems. Biometrika , 96, 37-50. Psychometrika, DOI: 10.1007/s11336-012-9274-4. Lynn Kuo (With Y. Zhao, M.-H. Chen, B. Pei, D. Rowe, (With D. Bandyopadhyay, V. H. Lachos and M. Castro) D-G Shin, W. Xie, and F. Yu) A Bayesian Approach to 2012. Skew-normal/independent linear mixed models Pathway Analysis by Integrating Gene-Gene Functional for censored responses with applications to HIV viral Directions and Microarray Data, Statistics in Biosciences, loads. Biometrical Journal , 54, 3, 405-425. 2012, V. 4(1), 105-131;; DOI 10.1007/s12561-011- 9046-1. Joseph Glaz (With Naus, J. and Wang, X.) (2012). Approximations and bounds for distribution of moving (With C. Song) Dynamic Frailty and Change Point sums of normal random variables. Methodology and Models for Recurrent Events Data, Journal of the Computing in Applied Probability 14, 597-616. Iranian Statistical Society , 2013, V. 12. (1) 127-151.
(With Wu, Tu.-L. and Fu, J. C.) (2013). Discrete, (With P.O. Lewis, W. Xie, M.-H. Chen, Y. Fan) Posterior Continuous and Conditional Variable Window Scan Predictive Bayesian Phylogenetic Model Selection. Statistics. Journal of Applied Probability , in press. Systematic Biology , in press.
(With Wang, X.) (2013). Variable window scan statistics (With Y. Fan, R. Wu, M.-H. Chen, P. O. Lewis) A for normal data. Communications in Statistics-Theory Conditional Autoregressive Model for Detecting Natural and Methods Ser. A., in press. Selection in Protein-Coding DNA Sequences. Proceedings of the 2012 International Chinese Statistical Association (With Chen, J.) (2013). Scan statistics for monitoring Applied Statistics Symposium, in press. data modeled by a negative binomial distribution. Proceeding of the XV International Symposium on Nitis Mukhopadhyay (With Bhargab Chattopadhyay) Applied Stochastic Models and Data Analysis, June 25- 2013. Asymptotic expansion of percentiles for a sample 28, 2013, Barcelona, Spain, in press. mean standardized by GMD: An application in the normal case. Journal of Japan Statistical Society , 42, Ofer Harel (With Chung, H. and Miglioretti, D.) 2013. 165-184. Latent class regression: inference and estimation with two-stage multiple imputation. Biometrical Journal , (With Sankha Muthu Poruthotage) 2013. Sequential 55(4), 541-553. fixed-width confidence interval procedures for the mean
15 under multiple boundary crossings. Sequential Analysis , (With J. P. Nolan) 2009. Simultaneous Prediction 32, 83-109. Intervals for ARMA Processes with Stable Innovations. J. Forecasting , 28, 235-246. (With Mun S. Son) 2013. Ratios X/Z, Y/Z built from independent random variables (X,Y) and Z may not Elizabeth Schifano (With L. Li, D.C. Christiani, and always be dependent. Statistical Methodology , 14, 62- X. Lin) 2013. Genome-wide Association Analysis for 66. Multiple Continuous Secondary Phenotypes. American Journal of Human Genetics , 92(5), 744-759. (With Swarnali Banerjee) 2013. Sufficiency, Fisher information, and ancillarity: Some clarifications. Metron , (With R.L. Strawderman and M.T. Wells) 2013. 71, 33-38. Hierarchical Bayes, Maximum a Posteriori Estimators, and Minimax Concave Penalized Likelihood Estimation. Vladimir Pozdnyakov (With J. M. Steele) A Electronic Journal of Statistics , 7, 973-990. Systematic Martingale Construction with Applications to Permutation Inequalities. Journal of Mathematical (With M.P. Epstein, L.F. Bielak, M.A. Juhn, S.L.R. Analysis and Applications , 407 (2013), 130-140. Kardia, P.A. Peyser, and X. Lin) 2012. SNP Set Association Analysis for Familial Data. Genetic (With K. Bharath and D. Dey) Asymptotics of a Epidemiology , 36, 797-810. Clustering Criterion for Smooth Distributions, Electronic Journal of Statistics , 7 (2013), 1078-1093. Rick Vitale 2010. Convex bodies and Gaussian (With B. Raman) On Gaussian HJM Framework for processes. Image Analysis and Stereology, 29, 13–19. Eurodollar Futures. Applied Stochastic Models in Business and Industry, 27 (2011), 284-401. 2008. On the Gaussian representation of intrinsic volumes. Statistics and Probability Letters , 78, 1246– (With Y. Fama) A Test for Self-exciting Clustering 1249. Mechanism. Statistics and Probability Letters , 81 (2011), 1541-1546. (With Y. Wang) 2008. The Wills functional for Gaussian processes. Statistics and Probability Letters , Nalini Ravishanker (With A. Thavaneswaran and Y. 78, 2181–2187. Liang) 2013. Inference for Linear and Non linear Stable Error Processes via Estimating Functions. Journal of 2007. Multivariate medians and measure— Statistical Planning and Inference , 143(4): 827-841. symmetrization. Proceedings, Vardi Memorial Conference. IMS Lecture Notes – Mongraph Series , 54, 260-267. (With J. Harvill and B. K. Ray) 2013. Bispectral-Based Models for Clustering Time Series. Computational Alexander Tartakovsky (With G. Fellouris) 2013. Statistics and Data Analysis 64, 113-131. Almost Minimax Sequential Tests of Composite Hypotheses. Statistica Sinica , vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 1717- (With S. Hu, J. N. Ivan and J. Mooradian) 1741. 2012. Temporal Modeling of Highway Crash Counts for Senior and Non-Senior Drivers. Accident Analysis and (With A.S. Polunchenko and G. Sokolov) 2013. Efficient Prevention , 50, 1003-1013. Computer Network Anomaly Detection by Changepoint
16 Detection Methods. IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in alternative to the parametric bootstrap. Canadian Signal Processing , vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 4-11. Journal of Statistics 40(3): 480-500.
(With G. Fellouris) Nearly Minimax Mixtures Rules for (With Huang, J.) 2012. Model selection for time-varying One-sided Sequential Testing. Sequential Analysis , vol. coefficient Cox models. Biometrics 68(2): 419-428. 31, no. 3, pp. 297-325. Published Books (With A.S. Polunchenko) 2012. State-of-the-Art in Sequential Change-Point Detection. Methodology and MingMingMing-Ming ---HuiHui Chen (with J.D. Petruccelli and B. Nandram) Computing in Applied Probability , vol. 14, no. 3, pp. 1999. Applied Statistics for Engineers. Text Book, 649-684. Prentice-Hall, Inc., ISBN 0-13-565953-1.
Xiaojing Wang (With J.O. Berger and L. Shen) 2013. (With Q.-M. Shao and J.G. Ibrahim) 2000. Monte Carlo A Bayesian Approach to Subgroup Identification. Journal Methods in Bayesian Computation. Springer-Verlag, of Biopharmaceutical Statistics (to appear) . ISBN 0-387-98935-8.
(With J.O. Berger and D.S. Burdick) 2013. Bayesian (With J.G. Ibrahim and D. Sinha) 2001. Bayesian Analysis of Dynamic Item Response Models. Annals of Survival Analysis. Springer-Verlag, ISBN 0-387-95277-2. Applied Statistics , 7(1):126-153. (With D.K. Dey, P. Müller, D. Sun and K. Ye) 2010. (With Y. Zhou, A.T.K. Wan and S. Xie) 2010. Wavelet Frontiers of Statistical Decision Making and Bayesian Analysis of Change-points in a Nonparametric Analysis --- In Honor of James O. Berger. Regression with Heteroscedastic Variance . Journal of Econometrics , 159 (1): 183-201. Dipak K. Dey (with S. Ghosh and B.K. Mallick) 2010. Bayesian Bioinformatics. Chapman & Hall CRC). (With Y. Zhou, A.T.K. Wan) 2008. Estimating Equations Inference with Missing Data. Journal of the American (With M.-H. Chen, P. Müller, D. Sun and K. Ye) 2010. Statistical Association , 103 (483): 1187-1199. Frontiers of Statistical Decision Making and Bayesian Analysis --- In Honor of James O. Berger. Jun Yan (with Wang, X. and Ma S.) 2013. Augmented estimating equations for semiparametric panel count Joseph Glaz (with N. Balakrishnan, Eds.) 1999. Recent regression with informative observation times and Advances on Scan Statistics. Birkhauser Publishers, censoring time. Statistica Sinica 23(1): 359-381. Boston.
(With Aseltine, R. and Harel, O.) 2013. Comparing (With J. Naus and S. Wallenstein) 2001. Scan regression coefficients between nested models for Statistics. Springer, New York. clustered data with generalized estimating equations. Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics 38(2): (With R. Baeza-Yates, J. Gzyl, J. Hüsler and J.L. 172-189. Palacios, Eds.) 2005. Recent Advances in Applied Probability. Springer, New York. (With Kojadinovic, I.) 2012. Goodness-of-fit testing based on a weighted bootstrap: A fast large-sample
17 (With J. Chiquet, N. Limnios and P. Moyal, Eds.) 2006. Introductory Statistical Inference (ISBN #13:978- 2008. Book of Abstracts. IWAP 2008, 4 th International 1-57444-613-5). Marcel Dekker (Taylor & Francis Workshop in Applied Probability, Université de Group). Technologie de Compiègne, Compiègne, France. (With Basil M. de Silva) 2009. Sequential Methods and (With V. Pozdnyakov and S. Wallenstein, Eds.) 2009. Their Applications (ISBN #13:978-1-58488-102-5). Scan Statistics: Methods and Applications. Birkhauser, Chapman & Hall/CRC. Boston. Nalini Ravishanker (With Richard A. Davis, Scott H. (With Aribas, A., Jiménez, R. and Romo, J.) 2010. Book Holan, and Robert B. Lund) Handbook of Discrete- of Abstracts . IWAP 2010, 5 th International Workshop in Valued Time Series. Chapman Hall, CRC, to be published Applied Probability, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, in summer 2014. Spain. (With D. K. Dey) 2002. A First Course in Linear (With Koutras, M. V., Eds.) 2010. Handbook on Scan Model Theory. Chapman Hall, CRC. Statistics. Springer (in preparation). Alexander Tartakovsky (With I. Nikoforov and M. OfOfOferOf er Harel 2009. Strategies for Data Analysis with Basseville) Sequential Analysis: Hypothesis Testing and Two Types of Missing Values: From Theory to Change-Point Detection. Chapman & Hall/CRC, to be Application. Lambert Academic Publishing. published December 2013.
Nitis Mukhopadhyay 2000. Probability and Statistical (With Adams, N.M. and Heard, N.A., Eds.) Rapid Inference (ISBN #0-8247-0379-0). Marcel Dekker Detection of Attacks in Computer Networks by Quickest (Taylor & Francis Group). Changepoint Detection Methods, Data Analysis for Network Cyber-Security. Imperial College Press, World (With S. Datta and S. Chattopadhyay) 2004. Applied Scientific, pp. 33-70, 2013. (awaiting publication)
Sequential Methodologies (ISBN #0-8247-5395-X). Marcel Dekker (Taylor & Francis Group).
From the Director of the Statistical
Consulting Services (SCS)
The Statistical Consulting Services (SCS) is primarily supported by the Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut. It serves as a statistical consulting resource for external clients in business, government, and industry. It also provides statistical services to faculty and graduate student researchers throughout the university and generates collaborative research with them. It serves as a training facility to graduate students in applied statistics. It provides a center for discussion on research problems and methodological advances in statistics and probability.
From Spring 2012 to Spring 2013, the SCS has received applications and provided statistical consulting services to over 30 projects. The clients within the University of Connecticut were
18 from CHIP affiliates, Department of Communication Sciences, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, Department of Geography, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, Department of Kinesiology, Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, Department of Nutritional Sciences, Department of Pathobiology and Veterinary Science, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the School of Pharmacy, Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture, and Department of Psychology. There were several projects from the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology, School of Dentistry at UCHC. There were also several clients from the local community, who were from Didato Group Company, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Stamford Hospital, Counseling and Wellness Center at the University of Saint Joseph, and the Department of Psychology at Western New England University.
This was the last year that SCS provided the statistical consulting services to the Center for Health, Intervention and Prevention (CHIP) under the contract signed by CHIP and the Department of Statistics in 2011. From August 2012, the statistical support to CHIP is provided by Professor Elizabeth Schifano as the replacement of the SCS. Professor Schifano works at CHIP ten hours per week to provide on-site services to the CHIP affiliates.
Pfizer Global Research & Development Student Fellowship Program (December 2007 - August, 2013)
In December 2007, the Department of Statistics at University of Connecticut and the Global Research & Development of Pfizer Inc. signed a joint agreement to develop a Fellowship program. Wangang Xie was the first Student Fellow. Under the agreement, he worked at Pfizer 10 hours each week in spring 2008 and 20 hours each week in Summer and Fall 2008. In November 2008, the Department of Statistics at the University of Connecticut and the Global Research & Development of Pfizer Inc. signed a joint agreement for the extension of the Fellowship program. Miaomiao Ge became the second Student Fellow under this agreement. This agreement was extended several times. Ms. Ge was the Student Fellow until August 2011. In Fall 2011, Ouyang Guang became the third Pfizer Student Fellow. Mr. Guang is currently working at Pfizer through the end of Summer 2013. Mr. Guang will continue to work at Pfizer for another year until the end of summer 2014.
Collaboration with the Center for Nursing Research (CNR) (Fall 2007-Spring 2013)
The Center for Nursing Research (CNR) was established in 1991 to support faculty, staff, students, and community health care professionals in developing research programs. The Director of CNR is Professor Deborah Shelton. From fall 2007 to spring 2011, the CNR hired Ms. Miaomiao Ge, a Ph.D. student of the Department of Statistics, as a half-time student assistant under supervision of Professor Ming-Hui Chen. In August 2011, the CNR hired Ms. Danjie Zhang as Miaomiao Ge’s replacement. Ms. Zhang worked at the CNR 10 hours each week as a half-time graduate assistant in both 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 academic years. In the fall 2013, Ms. Zhang will continue to work at the CNR.
19 FacFacultyulty Awards
Dipak K. Dey received the first Edward C. Marth Award for Mentoring Graduate Students from the American Association of the University Professor and the Graduate School, University of Connecticut in 2012. He was also elected to the University of Connecticut’s University Senate in 2013.
During the Annual Meeting 2013 of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), held in February 2013 in Boston, Massachusetts, Nitis Mukhopadhyay , was honored with a certificate and the AAAS Fellowship Rosette. The citation read, “Nitis Mukhopadhyay, University of Connecticut: For path-breaking contributions in sequential analysis and selection and ranking, influential books, exemplary editorial service, outstanding mentoring, and exceptional dedication to preserve statistical history.”
Ofer Harel was elected a member of the International Statistical Institute; the Statistics Section Council of the American Public Health Association (APHA); and the Council of Sections, Health Policy Statistics Section, the American Statistical Association. Ofer was also made Program Chair of the Health Policy Statistics Section (HPSS) of the American Statistical Association and is also now a Council of Chapters Representative, Connecticut Chapter, of the American Statistical Association.
Ming-Hui Chen , Professor, received the Research Excellence Award from the American Association of the University Professors, University of Connecticut, 2013 and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) Excellence in Research Award in the Physical Sciences Division, University of Connecticut, 2013.
Nalini Ravishanker was elected as a Member of the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering.
Kate McLaughlin , Statistics Lecturer, received the Outstanding Faculty Award, presented by the students in Student Support Services.
20 The 50 ththth Anniversary Celebration of
the Department of Statistics
By Joseph Glaz
Our department was founded in 1963. Last academic year, during November 1-3, 2012, we have celebrated the 50 th Anniversary of the Department. We were fortunate to have in attendance the founder of our department and its first Department Head, Professor Robert H. Riffenburgh, San Diego State University, to present a plenary lecture: “The Birth of the UConn Statistics Department: From Clay to Sculpture.” During this celebration we have enjoyed additional plenary lectures presented by distinguished colleagues. Professor Robert W. Makuch, Yale University, presented a lecture: Current Issues in Clinical Trials in Biostatistics. Professor Lawrence D. Brown, University of Pennsylvania, presented a lecture: Valid Statistical Inference after Model Selection aka Variable Selection Insurance . Professor Alan E. Gelfand, Duke University, presented a lecture: Analyzing Spatial Directional Data through the Use of Gaussian Processes . Professor Pranab K. Sen, University of North Carolina, presents a lecture: KPSS Statistics and Rank Tests for Short Memory Stationarity . Professor E. Jacquelin, Meredith College, presented a lecture: JSE, AP Statistics, and Randomization Tests in Statistics 101 – 30 Years of Change in Statistics Education .
The lectures and dinner reception have been enthusiastically attended by faculty, graduate students, colleagues from UConn and other institutions and our alumni. We were happy to see the Provost, Professor Mun Choi, Vice President for Research, Professor Suman Singha, and Professor Jeremy Teitelbaum, Dean of College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, joining us for the celebration and offering welcoming remarks to our distinguished speakers and guests. Photographs taken during the celebration are presented following this short article.
My colleagues and I were glad to see the publication of the volume Strength in Numbers: The Rising of Academic Statistics Departments in the U. S ., a few month after our celebration. The volume was edited by Professor Alan Agresti, University of Florida and Professor Xiao-Li Meng, Harvard University, and published by a prestigious academic publisher, Springer Science & Business Media. The volume includes a collection of articles about major well established Departments of Statistics in the US. We all were excited to see in this volume the article: University of Connecticut Department of Statistics, written by Professors Dipak K. Dey, Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Lynn Kuo and Ming-Hui Chen. The article describes well the founding process of the department, the initial challenges and the expansion of the department to its current stage, as one of the major statistics departments in New England, with a strong national and international reputation. It includes many interesting photographs. It is a pleasure to read!
21
From left: Joseph Glaz, Ofer Harel, Jacquelin Dietz Plenary lecture: Professor Robert Makuch and her husband, Richard, Rick Vitale, Nitis Mukhopadhyay and Uwe Koehn
From left: Richard and Jacquelin Dietz, Nitis From left: Robert Makuch and Joseph Glaz Mukhopadhyay and Robert Riffenburgh
Plenary lecture: Professor Larry Brown From left: Pranab K. Sen, Robert Riffenburgh and Joseph Glaz
22
From left: Pranab K. Sen, Joseph Glaz and Ofer Harel Plenary lecture: Professor Robert Riffenburgh
From left: Uwe Koehn and Robert Riffenburgh Audience at the plenary lectures presentations
From left: Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Tim Killeen, Alan Gelfand, Pranab K. Sen
23 The 23 rdrdrd Pfizer Colloquium Thursday, November 1, 2012
By Nitis Mukhopadhyay
The project on “Filming of Distinguished Statisticians” began more than 35 years ago at the University of Connecticut-Storrs. In view of the historical importance of this project, this joint initiative of the American Statistical Association (ASA), the Department of Statistics at the University of Connecticut-Storrs, and Pfizer Global Research and Development-Groton, Connecticut, had been continually funded.
The Project Director is Professor Nitis Mukhopadhyay. Dr. William T. Duggan (UConn-Storrs Ph.D. May 1999, Adv. Mukhopadhyay) of Pfizer serves as a Liaison.
At the recommendation of a national committee, a local organizing committee consisting of Professors Zhiyi Chi, Ming-Hui Chen, Dipak K. Dey, and Nitis Mukhopadhyay (Chair) invites the most distinguished statistical scientist to the campus of the University of Connecticut- Storrs. Along with the featured guest of honor, two other distinguished statisticians are normally invited.
Professor Pranab K. Sen
The featured guest of honor delivers a special lecture under the auspices of “Pfizer Colloquia by Distinguished Statisticians in Honor of Dr. David S. Salsburg.” Then, a “Conversation” with the featured guest of honor and two other distinguished statisticians is arranged under the auspices of “Conversations with Distinguished Statisticians in Memory of Professor Harry O. Posten.”
24 These are campus-wide live events, normally held on a Thursday evening, open to all, free of any charge. The same special lecture and the conversation segment are filmed in a studio, normally on the following Friday. Both films are eventually sent to the ASA for safe-keeping in its historical archive for future viewing, theoretically preserved for eternity.
The guest of honor and featured Speaker was Professor Pranab K. Sen. He is the Cary C. Boshamer Distinguished Professor of Biostatistics in the Department of Biostatistics, Gillings School of Public Health, McGavran-Greenberg Hall, University of North Carolina (UNC), Chapel Hill. He holds a joint appointment as a Professor in the Department of Statistics and Operations Research at UNC, Chapel Hill.
From left: Professor Malay Ghosh and Dr. George Williams
From left: Dr. Williams, Professors Ghosh, Ming-Hui Chen, Sen, and Mukhopadhyay
25 Professor Sen received the B.Sc. (1955) and M.Sc. (1957) degrees from Calcutta University, India and the Doctor of Philosophy in Science (Statistics) degree in 1962 from Calcutta University. He was awarded (i) S.S. Bose Gold Medal (1955) and (ii) Calcutta University Gold Medal (1957) in statistics for the best performance in the B.Sc. and M.Sc. examinations, (iii) Jubilee Scholarship (1955-57), (iv) Calcutta University and Government of India Research Training Scholarship (1958-61). He was the NSF-CBMS Lecturer in Statistics in 1983 hosted by the University of Iowa, Iowa City. I was fortunate enough to be invited to that NSF-CBMS lecture series.
Professor Sen’s honors and awards are too many to enumerate them all. He received the Charles University’s Prague Medal for outstanding contributions to Statistics (1988), McGavran Teaching Award from School of Public Health, UNC (1996), Commemoration Medal, Czech Union of Physicists and Mathematicians (1998), Senior Noether Scholar Award from the ASA in 2002 for his lifelong achievement in research and teaching nonparametrics. In 2010, the ASA presented the prestigious Samuel S. Wilks Award (Medal) to him for his outstanding contributions to statistics and biostatistics research and exceptional service in mentoring doctoral students. In 2011, the International Indian Statistical Association (IISA) conferred on him a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2012, UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health’s John E. Larsh, Jr. Mentoring Award was presented to him. Professor Sen was conferred the Honorary D.Sc. degree in 2012 by his Alma mater, the University of Calcutta.
He has been a statistical consultant to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, N.I.H., Bethesda for its project on Arteriosclerosis. Developed, among others, time-sequential statistical procedures in clinical trials, adopted by the Department of Biostatistics, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill for the omnibus project on human LIPIDS and their impact on the risk of heart attacks. Have been a statistical consultant to the National Reye's Syndrome Foundation on the RSSG project of the Medical College of Virginia, Richmond where the time- sequential procedures are also being advocated. He was a member of the Advisory Board on Clinical Trials, Glaxo Inc., R.T.P. (1989-1991).
Opening ceremony: From left, Professors Mukhopadhyay, Ghosh, Sen, Dr. Williams, Professor Joe Glaz, and Dr. Suman Singha
26
He has authored, coauthored, and edited more than 26 books and monographs and has also supervised and mentored 84 Ph.D. students, practically in all areas of statistical science. His first publication dates back to 1958 and ever since he has vigorously continued to write fundamental research papers in many areas including probability theory, large-sample theory, nonparametrics, multivariate analysis, clinical trials, sequential analysis, reliability analysis, biostatistics, and bioinformatics. Professor Sen is one of the very rare breed of exceptionally deep scholars who has made breakthrough contributions in applied statistical sciences on numerous occasions. His list of major publications in leading international journals includes more than 600 items and too many of them are regarded as genuine classics. He has traveled to nearly all corners of the globe multiple times.
Pfizer colloquium students’ social
The 23 rd Pfizer Colloquium “A Pedestrian’s Lost Horizon in the Wiener Wald of Statistical Science” was delivered by Professor Sen on Thursday, November 1, 2012.
In addition to Professor Sen, we also had two very distinguished statisticians on hand: Professor Malay Ghosh (Distinguished Professor, Department of Statistics, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.) and Dr. George W. Williams (Vice President, Global Biomedical Data Sciences and Head, Center for Observational Research at Amgen, California). Professor Ghosh and Dr. Williams were first Ph.D. students (1969) of Professor Sen in statistics and biostatistics respectively. You may not realize this, but I was the first Ph.D. student of Professor Ghosh.
Professor Sen’s colloquium was followed by a very lively and spirited conversation with Professor Ghosh and Dr. Williams about Professor Sen’s illustrious career, research philosophy, teaching philosophy, life in general, mentoring and many more topics. The same two segments were filmed in a studio for ASA’s archive on Friday, November 2, 2012.
The Thursday’s events held on November 1, 2012 were live on campus. All graduate and undergraduate students got a special opportunity and a treat to meet these distinguished
27 colleagues by themselves in a group organized as Students’ Social. This event turns out to be a grand celebration of statistics every time and this past November’s event was no exception.
A large part of the funding came from the ASA which was supplemented by generous support from Statistical Consulting Services (Courtesy: Professor Ming-Hui Chen), the consulting by Professors Ofer Harel and Nitis Mukhopadhyay, the CLAS Dean’s Office (Courtesy: Professor Dipak K. Dey), the Provost’s Office (Courtesy: Dr. Suman Singha), and the Department of Statistics (Courtesy: Professor Joe Glaz). Apologies if I have missed out any name. Thanks to all these colleagues and everyone else who supported this project in numerous ways.
Pfizer colloquium students’ social
Pfizer colloquium students’ social
28
The 27 ththth New England Statistics
Symposium
By Ming-Hui Chen, Planning Committee Chair
The Department of Statistics of the University of Connecticut hosted the New England Statistics Symposium (NESS) on Saturday, April 27, 2013. The purpose of NESS is to bring together statisticians from all over New England to a central location to share research, discuss emerging issues in the field and to network with colleagues.
This NESS was started with a brief speech by Professor Eric Kolaczyk of Boston University in remembrance of Lingzi Lu, the first year student in statistics at Boston University who lost her young life in the senseless bombing at the Boston marathon on April 14, 2013, and followed by a moment of silence to all victims. The 27th NESS’s welcome and opening remarks were delivered by Joseph Glaz, Professor and the Head of the Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, Jeremy Teitelbaum, Professor of Mathematics and Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS), University of Connecticut, and Mun Choi, Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, Provost Office, University of Connecticut.
This annual statistics symposium featured two keynote talks by Professors Mike West of Duke University and Richard Bass of University. Their talks on “ Bayesian Dynamic Modelling: Multivariate Time Series, Sparsity & Dynamic Networks ” and “ A Central Limit Theorem for Symmetric Markov Chains” were well attended by the symposium participants. These two keynote speakers were introduced by Professors Nalini Ravishanker and Rick Vitale of University of Connecticut.
In this NESS, there were also three full day short courses entitled “Bayesian Dynamic Models, Time Series Analysis & Forecasting” presented by the Arts & Sciences Professor of Statistical Science, Mike West, “An Introduction to the Analysis of Incomplete Data” presented by Professor Ofer Harel of University of Connecticut and Research Fellow Gregory J. Matthews of the School of Public Health at the University of Massachusetts – Amherst, and “Statistical Analysis of Spatial Data and Visualization with Google Map” presented by Professor Jun Yan of University of Connecticut and Professor Marcos O. Prates of Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil, on Friday, April 26, 2013. About 68 participants took the short courses.
In addition, there were twelve invited themed sessions including one invited panel discussion session on career opportunities in statistics and two contributed sessions. The topics of these oral presentations include Statistics in Insurance and Actuarial Science, New Methodologies from Young Researchers, Statistical Inference for Genomics and Stochastic Models, Recent Developments in Spatial Statistics, Statistical Methods for Big Health Science Data, Statistical Practice in Business Analytics, New Developments in the Analysis of Incomplete Data, Probability and Mathematical Statistics, Challenges in Modern Modeling Methods, Genome- wide Association Studies, Sparse Regression and ODE Inference, and Methods for Clinical Trials for Biosimilars. It was the first time in the NESS history that a poster session sponsored by
29 Cigna was held during the lunch time (12:30pm – 2:10pm). It was a great success and 37 posters were presented in this poster session. Overall, there were over 227 participants attended this year’s NESS or short courses.
This year, we received 22 papers for three IBM Student Awards. The double-blinded versions of these papers were reviewed by the members of the IBM student paper award committee chaired by Ming-Hui Chen of University of Connecticut. This year, Zhiyi Chi, Ofer Harel, Lynn Kuo, and Jun Yan of University of Connecticut, and Fei Liu of IBM T.J. Watson Research served on this committee. Based on the overall quality of the research, the winners of 2013 IBM T.J. Watson student awards were Alexander M. Franks, Department of Statistics, Harvard University on “Estimating a Structured Covariance Matrix from Multi-lab Measurements in High-throughput Biology” (Advisor: Edoardo Airoldi); Gyuhyeong Goh, Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, on “Bayesian Predictive Model Assessment and Selection with Bregman Divergence” (Advisor: Dipak K. Dey); and Zhao Ren, Department of Statistics, Yale University, on “Statistical Inference and Optimalities in Estimation of Gaussian Graphical Model” (Advisor: Harrison Zhou). J. R. M. Hosking of IBM T. J. Watson Research Center, Dipak K. Dey, Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor and the Associate Dean of the CLAS, University of Connecticut, and two keynote speakers presented a beautiful engraved plague to each winner in the Student Paper Award and Closing Reception.
This year’s NESS was sponsored by Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Cigna, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, the Connecticut Chapter of the American Statistical Association, Section on Economics, Finance and Business of the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA/EFaB), Pfizer Inc., Travelers, the Office of Sponsored Programs, Dean’s Office of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, and the Department of Statistics of the University of Connecticut. With the financial support provided by IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, the organizing committee was able to waive the registration fees for attending both NESS and the short courses for all student participants who gave oral or poster presentations at the symposium. At the evening of April 16, more than 40 participants attended this NESS dinner at Chang's Garden Restaurant. Professors Ming-Hui Chen (chair), Ofer Harel, and Jun Yan served on this year’s planning committee.
This year marked the 27th anniversary of the New England Statistics Symposium. We hosted a NESS mixer in the evening of April 26, 2013: 5:00pm-7:00pm, Room 330, Student Union. The first New England Statistics Symposium was held at the University of Connecticut in 1987 and we continue the tradition of hosting the symposium on alternate years. On other years it rotates among Colleges and Universities throughout New England. The 28th New England Statistics Symposium will be hosted by the Department of Biostatistics, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, on April 26, 2014.
30
Mike West; the IBM Student Paper Award winner, Gyuhyeong Goh; J. R. M. Hosking; Dipak K. Dey; Richard Bass
Joseph Glaz at the 2013 NESS Welcome and Opening Remarks
31
The 2013 NESS Short Course Registration at Student Union on April 26
Lynn Kuo and Herman Chernoff at the 2013 NESS
32
NESS participants at the 2013 NESS Lunch
2013 NESS Posters I
33
2013 NESS Posters II
2013 NESS Posters III
34
The 4 ttththhh International Workshop in Sequential Methodologies July 1717----21,21, 2013
By Nitis Mukhopadhyay
1. Introduction
The 4 th International Workshop in Sequential Methodologies (IWSM 2013) was recently hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens (UGA), USA, July 17-21, 2013. The Co-Organizers were Professors T. N. Sriram and Nitis Mukhopadhyay with Professor Sriram serving as the chair for the local committee, jointly Professor Ahyuday Mandal.
The conference was held inside the Georgia Center at UGA, a wonderful and modern facility, housing all conference rooms, registration, exhibit halls, banquet halls, breakfast-lunch-dinner opportunities and a superb hotel, all under one roof. The delegates loved this al-in-one facility and I thank Professors Sriram and Mandal for offering such seamless local arrangements.
This was a highly successful and stimulating conference. It was attended by participants from numerous countries. The delegates came from all over the world with significant representations from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Japan, Republic of Georgia, Taiwan, United Kingdom, and the United States. A large number of young colleagues and graduate students, both men and women, presented full-length invited papers alongside those who are well-known and established.
2. More Specifics
The first three plenary lectures were delivered by Professors Alexander Tartakovsky (University of Southern California-Los Angeles, USA and University of Connecticut-Storrs, USA), Professor Shelemyahu Zacks (Binghamton University-New York, USA), and Makoto Aoshima (University of Tsukuba-Ibaraki, Japan). Their presented topics were respectively “Sequential Hypothesis Tests: Historical Overview and Recent Results ,” “ Exact Distributions of Stopping Times in Two-Stage and Sequential Sampling ,” and “ Effective Methodologies for High-Dimensional Data .” I will mention the 4 th plenary lecture shortly.
Invited paper sessions were devoted to many topics including Adaptive Designs in Clinical Trials, Change-Point Detection in Time Series, Multiple Comparisons in Sequential Experiments, Design of Experiments, Applications of Change-Point Detection, Optimal Stopping and Sequential Statistics, Recent Advances in Sequential Methodologies with Applications, Change Detection in Functional Sequences, Sequential Estimation for Dependent Data, Sequential Methodologies and High-Dimensional Data Analysis, Recent Results in Sequential Analysis and
35 Change-Point Analysis, Applications of Sequential Analysis, Sensor Exploitation, Sequential Inference, and Change-Point Detection and Skew Distributions.
In the invited session titled Recent Advances in Sequential Methodologies-II (Organized and Chaired by Professor T. K. S. Solanky, UConn-Storrs Ph.D. August 1990), I gave a lecture “On Determination of an Appropriate Pilot Sample Size.” Professor Bhargab Chattopadhyay (UConn-Storrs Ph.D. August 2012) organized and chaired an invited paper session.
I organized two invited paper sessions on “Sequential Methods in the Hands of Young Researchers” where the following young speakers presented full-length invited papers: Professor Kazuyoshi Yata (Japan), Professor Bhargab Chattopadhyay (UConn-Storrs Ph.D. August 2012), Mr. Bruno Buonaguidi (Italy), Professor Aleksey Polunchenko (USA), Sankha Muthu Poruthotage (UConn-Storrs Ph.D. August 2012), and Swarnali Banerjee (UConn-Storrs). I chaired one of these sessions and Professor Debanjan Bhattacharjee (UConn-Storrs Ph.D. August 2011) chaired the other session.
Back row from left to right: Professor Venu Veeravalli, Nitis and Mahua Mukhopadhyay, Professor Shelley Zacks, and Professor Makoto Aoshima. Front row: Two daughters of Professor Aoshima.
3. The Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis
The international Abraham Wald Prize award committee consisted of Professors M. Aoshima, M. Baron, P. Chen, and T. K. S. Solanky (Chair). All Associate Editors of the Sequential Analysis (SQA) journal were given the opportunity to rank all manuscripts that were published in SQA (2012). This prestigious prize is co-sponsored by the Wald family, the Taylor & Francis Group,
36 as well as the Associate Editors and friends of SQA. My hearty thanks go to the international Abraham Wald Prize committee members.
During the 4 th IWSM 2013, I had organized a special session on Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis ceremony. This year’s winner (2013) was Dr. Allan Gut, Professor Emeritus, Matematiska Institutionen, Uppsala Universitet, Uppsala, Sweden for his paper, “Anscombe’s Theorem 60 Years Later” which appeared in SQA 2012, vol. 31, no. 3 (Special Frank Anscombe Appreciation Issue celebrating 60 years of his random CLT), pp. 368-396. Professor Gut could not attend this year’s IWSM due to a conflict with another conference in Europe.
The 2013 Abraham Prize in Sequential Analysis plaque awarded to Dr. Allan Gut, in absentia.
Dr. Allan Gut, Professor Emeritus, Matematiska Institutionen, Uppsala Universitet, Uppsala, Sweden.
This paper appeared in print with invited and highly spirited discussion pieces from a number of international experts in this topic followed by responses from the author himself. Congratulations to Professor Gut.
37 After receiving the news of this prestigious award, Professor Gut wrote, “… these are most overwhelming and completely unexpected news. I have been totally incapable of doing anything sensible since I received your mail a few hours ago, and which I now have read several times.”
“My interest in the area of first passage times/sequential analysis began with Uma Prabhu’s book ‘Stochastic Processes’ which I took as a reading course in 1967, in particular Chapters 5 and 6. Somewhat later, Professor Esseen gave a series of seminars in that area, which led me to my 1972 thesis that then was published in Annals of Probability (1974), vol. 2.”
“… Let me express my sincere, humble and multidimensional thanks for bestowing upon me the honor of having been (s)elected as the recipient of this year’s Abraham Wald prize in Sequential Analysis.”
4. SQA Editor's Special Invited Paper
During this IWSM 2013, I invited Professor Ansgar Steland (RWRH Aachen University, Germany) to present the SQA Editor's Special Invited Paper, the 4 th plenary lecture, immediately following Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis ceremony.
Dr. Steland from the Department of Mathematics, RWTH Aachen University is a Professor of Stochastics, Change-Point Analysis, and Sequential Analysis. He is a remarkable colleague and a leading expert in Applied Mathematical Finance and Statistics in Finance, Mathematical Econometrics, Nonparametrics and Empirical Processes, Time Series Analysis, and Statistical Genetics.
Mukhopadhyay introducing Ansgar Steland before his plenary presentation.
Professor Steland presented a very thorough and interesting discourse entitled “Nonparametric Monitoring of Time Series.” The energy and enthusiasm experienced during this special session were very highly appreciated by all.
38 5. A Collage of Photos from IWSM
This IWSM gave all a perfect opportunity to pause for a moment and celebrate the 80 th birthday of Professor Shelemyahu Zacks at the conference banquet in admiration and gratitude for his continued support, mentorship, and numerous path-breaking and seminal contributions in this field.
The 80 th birthday celebration honoring Professor Shelemyahu Zacks. Photo with Mrs. Hanna Zacks.
From the next set of photos, how many people are you able to identify? Not too many? Please keep trying! Remember, practice makes it perfect.
39
40 Hint: You may identify Professor & Mrs. Sriram, Professor & Mrs. Mandal, Mrs. Aoshima, Professors K. Yata, Marlo Brown, Tung-Lung Wu, Hokwon Cho, T. K. S. Solanky, Elena Buzaianu, Michael Baron, Debanjan Bhattacharjee, as well as Dr. Sankha Muthu Poruthotage, Ms. Swarnali Banerjee, and Mr. Bruno Buonaguidi.
6. The 5 th IWSM 2015 Host Institution
The 5 th International Workshop in Sequential Methodologies will be hosted by the Department of Statistics at Columbia University, New York, June 22-24, 2015. The local contact would be Professor Zhiliang Ying. More information and appropriate announcements will be forthcoming, but the date and location of the 5 th IWSM have already been confirmed. It is time to mark the calendar now.
ISBA Regional Meeting aaandand InterInternationalnational Workshop/Conference on Bayesian Theory and Applications (IWCBTA) January 66----10101010,, 2013
DST Centre for Interdisciplinary Mathematical Sciences & Department of Statistics Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India
The year 2013 is going to be remembered in the history of Bayesian Statistics in India. Not only because we organized an International Workshop/Conference on Bayesian Theory and Applications (IWCBTA) at the beautiful campus of Banaras Hindu University but also because the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA) entrusted us to hold its Regional Meeting perhaps for the first time in Indian subcontinent rather in Asia. We feel excited that we took up this challenging task after a span of nearly 08 years when we organized our last big event under the patronage of Banaras Hindu University. This time DST Centre for Interdisciplinary Mathematical Sciences (DST-CIMS), a newly created interdisciplinary research centre, came forward and took up a lead role in a joint collaboration with the Department of Statistics, Banaras Hindu University.
41 The event was organized with several objectives, the most important being to create an environment where we can see the flow of Bayesian ideas from Bayesians to semi Bayesians or non-Bayesians. To boost up and meet our objectives, we also planned to hold tutorial lectures mainly for the young participants, practicing statisticians and data analysts. We tried our level best to design our program in such a way that we may stare the developments of the subject from a relatively elementary level to its current frontiers. Ernest Fokou é (Rochester Institute of Technology, USA), Sanjib Basu (Northern Illinois University, USA), John Geweke (University of Technology, Sydney, Australia) and José Bernardo (University of Valencia, Spain) kindly consented to deliver series of lectures for such a program on January 6 th and forenoon of January 7th. We also provided a free slot for Interactive discussion among the participants and the resource persons that mainly focused on individual level problems of researchers from several applied fields. Besides researchers from statistics, our participants also included practicing statisticians and researchers from several other areas such as economics, social sciences, medical sciences and epidemiology, engineering sciences, computer sciences, etc. Undoubtedly, we had a solid balance between theory, methods and applications. We are happy to proclaim that we met our intended objectives quite far from what we actually expected or desired. People realized that Bayesian paradigm has the capability of solving their complex problems in a more realistic framework. This program also helped to build up a confidence level among practicing statisticians, especially the young researchers, who are afraid of Bayesian paradigm because of the lack of appropriate knowledge, for instance, on the issues involving choice of priors and implementation of MCMC simulation in non-regular situations.
The ‘ISBA Regional Meeting and IWCBTA’ was formally inaugurated on Jan. 7, 2013 at 3:00 PM with Prof. J.K. Ghosh, Indian Statistical Institute & Purdue University, presiding over the function. A number of Bayesian giants including Prof. James Berger, Duke University, and Prof. Merlise Clyde, ISBA President, addressed the august gathering. The speakers were happy that such a nicely planned event is being organized in this part of the world and, as such, it is expected to provide a good future collaboration between ISBA and the Indian Bayesian researchers. Prof. Merlise Clyde was especially happy and felt satisfied that this will also provide an opportunity to ISBA to widen its coverage. Prof. Berger recalled his earlier visits to India and he felt that Indian Bayesians are fast changing and coming at par with the global standard. Prof. Ghosh discussed many things that are likely to help future planning of Indian Bayesians. He was also satisfied with the way the present event was planned but simultaneously gave a message that Indian Bayesians are supposed to go further to intensify their researches. He strongly told and expected from the young audience that there is a need to promote Interdisciplinary researches in the future to come and was quite hopeful that Indian statisticians will once again prove their worth.
The present conference aimed to cover a broad spectrum of topics at the cutting edge and simultaneously attempted to cover a wide variety of application areas where Bayes paradigm acquires a remarkable depth. A few of these were Environmental and Spatial Statistics, Agricultural Statistics, Survival Analysis and Reliability, Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Image Analysis, Objective Bayesian Methods, Methods for High or Infinite Dimensional Data, Econometrics, Markov Chain Monte Carlo Methods and their Advancements, Business Statistics, Social Statistics, Official Statistics and Survey Sampling, etc. Among many goals that we foresee, the most important being the creation of a platform where the young statisticians
42 may avail an opportunity to interact with the subject experts coming from both within the country and outside and, as a result, may deepen their knowledge of Bayesian statistics both as a statistical paradigm and as a tool to solve the complexities of other disciplines. This latter aspect was expected to enhance the interdisciplinary aspects of Bayesian statistics, a real need of today’s world. We are happy to proclaim that our conference has further consolidated, enriched and widened the scope of Bayesian Analysis, theory, methods and applications.
The presentations for the entire program were divided into a number of categories. Our plenary sessions included 12 tutorial Lectures, 04 Key note addresses and 17 plenary talks, covered by eminent Bayesian scientists from different parts of the world. Our keynote speakers included Bayesian giants such as Prof. James O. Berger, Duke University, USA, Prof. Jayanta K. Ghosh, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata, and Purdue University, USA, Prof. Peter Green, FRS, University of Bristol, United Kingdom, and Prof. Christian P. Robert, University of Paris, France. The topics covered by the Keynote speakers were of general interest and, as such, attended not only by statisticians but also by many other experts from different fields. Whereas Prof. Berger discussed on Reproducibility of Science: P-values and Multiplicity, Prof. Ghosh tried to provide interesting connections and interpretations between Bayesian nonparametrics, clustering, social networks, etc. Prof. Green discussed a highly significant problem on emission tomography and attempted successfully to relate it with the Bayesian inverse problem. Prof. Christian Robert was concerned with several aspects of Bayesian computational issues and mainly focused on ‘how approximative are approximative Bayesian calculations’. He established a few asymptotic validations of his approximate computational strategies for the models of complexities where further degree of approximation becomes unavoidable and concluded that these approximations open new ways for conducting Bayesian inferences.
Plenary speakers included giants such as Nozer Singpurwalla, The George Washington University, USA, John Geweke, University of Technology, Sydney, Kanti Mardia, University of Leeds, UK, Balgobin Nandram, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA, Anthony O’Hagan, University of Sheffield, UK, Robert Kohn, The Australian School of Business, J. Sethuraman, Florida State University, USA, M.J. Bayarri, University of Valencia, Spain, Fabrizio Ruggeri, CNR- IMATI, Italy, Peter Mueller, University of Texas, USA, Malay Ghosh, University of Florida, USA, José M. Bernardo, University of Valencia, Spain, Chris Holmes, University of Oxford, UK, Reinhard Viertl, Technische Universitaet Wien, Austria, Michael Goldstein, University of Durham, UK, Murray Aitkin, The University of Melbourne, Australia, and Bani Mallick, University of Texas, USA. These plenary talks considered a variety of problems on various social aspects besides providing new and improved techniques of Bayesian paradigm. A few of the topics included Bayesian Survey Sampling, Elusive Concept of Effective Sample Size, Uncertainty Analysis of Complex Physical Systems, Hidden Markov Models with Application to Cancer Genomics, Price and Prejudice in Interdisciplinary Research, Bayesian Uncertainty Quantification, Uncertainty Analysis for Nonignorable Nonresponse, Prior Distribution and Posterior Inferences when the Model is Wrong, Bayesian Analysis and Fuzzy Information, Filtering Reliability and Tracking Survivability, etc. The presentations were mainly based on broad strategies without unduly concentrating on specific themes.
Besides, we had a number of parallel Invited, Contributory and Poster presentations. In all, we were having 105 Invited speakers distributed in 34 parallel sessions on the last three days.
43 These sessions covered a number of broadly classified topics from various disciplines. A few among these included Spatial, Cluster, and Functional Data Analysis, Regression Analysis with Discrete Response, Nonparametric Bayesian Procedures (both theories and applications), Machine Learning, Bayesian Modelling and Computing, Bayes Methods for Stochastic Volatility Models, Cancer Survivor Study, Cutting-edge Monte Carlo Methods, Bayesian Analysis for Spatial and Spatio-temporal Data, Bayesian Thinking in Biomedical Research, Bayesian Applications in Interdisciplinary Researches, Modern Statistical Modelling, Recent Advances to Both Applications and Theories of Bayesian Methods, Reliability, Risk Analyses and Related Areas, Bayesian Approaches to Complex Regression Models in Medical Research, Nonparametric Models and Spatial Dependencies, Bayesian Model Comparison, Bayesian Signal and Image Analysis, Intersection of Bayesian Methods and Causal Inference, Bayes Robustness and Survey Sampling, Advanced Computing Algorithms and Interdisciplinary Applications, Bayesian Shape Analysis, Some Advanced Bio-statistical Applications, Bayes Classification, Sequential Bayes Procedures, Bayesian Meta Analysis, Semi-parametric Regression, Particle Filtering, Bayes Methods for Astrophysical Models and Astronomical Data Analysis, and Inferences for System Biology Models, etc. Perhaps for the first time in our country, we had an international Bayesian event in a true sense covering a wide variety of topics and having got representations from countries such as Australia, Austria, Brazil, Bangladesh, Canada, China, France, Finland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Nepal, Netherlands, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, USA, and, of course, India.
A few of our internationally known presenters in the Invited sessions included Murray Aitkin, Rex Lau, Rodney Strachan, Matt Wand, Sally Wood, Australia; Marcia Branco, Rosangela Loschi, Brazil; Yogendra Chaubey, Michael Evans, Radhey S. Singh, Canada; Emily Lei Kang, China, Aki Vehtari, Finland; Frederic Bois, Nicolas Chopin, Judith Rousseau, France; Ashok Bansal, Madhuchhanda Bhattacharjee, Abhishek Bhattacharya, Pulak Ghosh, Akanksha Gupta, Athar A Khan, Arnab Laha, Ram K. Singh, Umesh Singh, Richa Srivastava, S.K. Upadhyay, India; Yoel Haitovsky, Israel; Raffaele Argiento, Pierpaolo De Blasi, Sonia Petrone, Antonio Pievatolo, Igor Pruenster, Matteo Ruggiero, Italy; Yuzo Maruyama, Yasuhiro Omori, Toshiaki Watanabe, Japan; Yeonseung Chung, Sung-Ho Kim, Jaeyong Lee, Republic of Korea; Ramses Mena, Mexico; Harry van Zanten, The Netherlands, Giovani Silva, Portugal; Pierre Jacob, Singapore; David Rios Insua, Spain; Antonietta Mira, Switzerland, Christophe Andrieu, Arnab Bhattacharjee, Ian Dryden, Ian Jermyn, Adam Johansen, Robin Mitra, Sumeetpal Singh, Dario Spano, David A van Dyk, Simon Wilson, UK.
Our maximum invited participants joined from USA. They included speakers such as Dipankar Bandyopadhyay, Sudipto Banerjee, Adrian Barbu, Sanjib Basu, Saonli Basu, Anirban Bhattacharya, Snigdhansu Chatterjee, Merlise Clyde, Tanujit Dey, Ernest Fokoue, Joyee Ghosh, Robert Gramacy, Michele Guindani, Jennifer Hill, Lurdes Inoue, Timothy Johnson, Wesley Johnson, Prasenjit Kapat, Meena Khare, Saki Kinney, Sebastian Kurtek, Purushottam Laud, Chae Young Lim, Bani Mallick, Debashis Mondal, Bhramar Mukherjee, Sayan Mukherjee, Debdeep Pati, Rajib Paul, T. Raghunathan, Shesh N. Rai, Kenneth Rice, James Robins, Abel Rodriguez, Vivekananda Roy, Satrajit Roychoudhury, Scott Schmidler, Pradeep Singh, Debajyoti Sinha, Anuj Srivastava, Deokumar Srivastava, Jonathan Stroud, Jeremy Taylor, Ram C. Tiwari, Surya Tokdar and Lorenzo Trippa, etc.
44
A number of invited presentations were noteworthy. Most of these presentations were such remarkable that these were actually meant for Plenary sessions but due to lack of time slots, the organizers were having no options except to keep them in Invited parallel sessions. A few among these included the presentations by Rodney Strachan, Matt Wand, Nicolas Chopin, Judith Rousseau, David Rios Insua, Antonietta Mira, Ian Dryden, Ian Jermyn, David A van Dyk, Simon Wilson, Sudipto Banerjee, Merlise Clyde, Scott Schmidler, Debajyoti Sinha, Anuj Srivastava, Jeremy Taylor, Ram C. Tiwari, etc., which should have been scheduled under Plenary sessions.
We also had a number of parallel contributory and poster presentations. There were in all 80 presentations in Contributory sessions and 69 presentations in Poster sessions. The contributors included speakers from India, France, Sweden, South Africa, and USA, etc. Some of the presentations were quite striking and established the scope of Bayesian paradigm significantly. In a nutshell, it can be concluded that none of our sessions was less important than all others. Throughout the student presenters appeared to be quite enthusiastic as they often received encouraging remarks on their presentations and, of course, some fruitful suggestions for their future researches.
The organizers had tremendous support from International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA). As many as 10 presidents including a present and a future President joined the event. Besides, we were having several other office bearers from ISBA who not only contributed but offered to provide enough support in future to our young researchers and scientists. They were all along engaged in off and on discussions with our researchers and young scholars and always tried to promote Bayesian activities in this part of the world.
We also had sessions for best paper presentation award. As many as six presenters participated in this competition. Our Jury members included giants such as Kanti Mardia (Chair), University of Leeds, UK, José Bernardo, Valencia University, Spain, Michael Evans, University of Tornoto, Canada, and Ram K. Singh, University of Lucknow, India. The jury members finally decided first two prizes to be given to Miss Akanksha Gupta and Miss Richa Srivastava of Banaras Hindu University for their presentations in Bayesian biostatistics. The other participants were also recommended for ‘Certificate of Merit’ based on their quality presentations and responses to questions put by the audience. It was remarked by the jury Chair, Kanti Mardia, that all the presenters were strong contenders and there was neck to neck fight among the presenters for the award of best two presentations.
Besides other important activities including a few social events, the organizers had an opportunity to celebrate 250 th Birth anniversary of Bayes Theorem and 20 th Birth Anniversary of ISBA. The main objective behind this celebration was to bring together ISBA representatives and the Indian Bayesians so that they may visualize the academic requirements of each group and, as a result, ISBA may act accordingly in the academic interest of Indian Bayesians and those of Indian subcontinent. This program was a joint venture with Indian Bayesian Society and Indian Chapter of ISBA. Padma Shri Prof. Lalji Singh, Vice-Chancellor, Banaras Hindu University, was the Chief-guest. The three presidents of ISBA (present, past and future) addressed the audience on this occasion. They all appeared satisfied with the type of conference that we had.
45 They told that they did not expect such a huge gathering of worldwide Bayesian stalwarts before coming to Varanasi but it was really an amazing experience. The nicely planned event and such widely varied topics in the deliberation were the result of a really well-planned and systematic effort of organizers and ISBA is happy that they announced their Regional meeting in India. The ISBA representatives also discussed with a number of Indian Bayesians (especially the young scholars) on their exclusive expectations from ISBA to help improve the Interdisciplinary interest of Indian Bayesians. They assured that they will always consider protecting the interest of Bayesian statisticians of this region to their best possible extent. They felt as if there is a need of several such meetings in this part of the world so that ISBA can achieve its intended objectives at a global front. This is perhaps the objectives with which ISBA was created.
Ronald Wasserstein, Executive Director, American Statistical Association, also supported us enormously. It was because of him that our event was listed in the International Year of Statistics-2013. We express our sincere thanks to Ronald Wasserstein. This event was among the first events to celebrate the International Year of Statistics-2013.
A conference on ISBA Regional Meeting & International Workshop/Conference on Bayesian Theory and Applications is one of the first meetings of the International Year of Statistics-2013. This meeting was planned to widen further the realms of statistics in many more areas, especially the interdisciplinary areas of applications where the subject is struggling to deepen its routes. The meeting was significant in the sense that it attempted to bring together the statisticians and the Bayesian statisticians from a number of countries on a single platform of Banaras Hindu University. It is expected that the theories, computational aspects and the applications have all been enriched further as a result of this global interaction. Our endeavor is certainly going to enrich statistics and to develop it as an important interdisciplinary tool.
Our event received a world wide support from scientific communities and organizations. A few among these were International Society for Bayesian Analysis; Indian Chapter of ISBA; Indian Bayesian Society; International Indian Statistical Association; Royal Statistical Society; Atlas Conferences, USA and Institute of Mathematical Statistics, USA. Our Indian sponsors included Banaras Hindu University, Department of Science & Technology, New Delhi, Council of Scientific and Industrial research, New Delhi, Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi, Indian Council of Medical Research, New Delhi, and CSO, Ministry of Statistics & Program Implementation, New Delhi.
We are thankful to all those who were associated with us directly or indirectly to make our venture a grand success.
Satyanshu Upadhyay Dipak K. Dey Chair Local Organizing Committee Chair, International Organizing Committee
46
Dignitaries releasing the Souvenir and the Abstract Book (L to R): Umesh Singh, S.K. Upadhyay, Merlise Clyde, Jayanta Ghosh, James Berger, S.K. Sengupta, K.K. Singh (Inaugural Function-Jan. 7, 2013)
Colloquia We continue to have a stream of excellent colloquia:
Haim Bar Scott H. Holan Department of Statistical Science, Cornell University Department of Statistics, University of Missouri Kun Chen Tania B. Huedo-Medina Department of Statistics, Kansas State University Department of Allied Health Sciences, University of Bertrand S. Clarke Connecticut Department of Medicine, Center for Computational Science, Emily Kang University of Miami Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Cincinnati Michelle R. Danaher Chunsheng Ma National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Department of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics, Wichita Dean Follmann State University Biostatistics Research Branch, National Institute of Allergy and Chaitra H. Nagaraja Infectious Diseases Assistant Professor of Management Systems (Statistics), Duncan K. H. Fong Fordham Business Schools Smeal College of Business, Penn State University Hon Keung Tony Ng Roee Gutman Department of Statistical Science, South Methodist University Department of Biostatistics and Center for Statistical Sciences, Chris Parks Brown University Travelers Insurance Laura A. Hatfield Marcos O. Prates Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil
47 Long Qu Department of Statistics, Iowa State University Chuanhua Julia Xing Alexander Tartakovsky Department of Biostatistics, Boston University Department of Mathematics, University of Southern California Yuping Zhang Yufeng Wu The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University Harrison Zhou of Connecticut Department of Statistics, Yale University
Faculty News
Nitis Mukhopadhyay is serving as the Guest Editor for two full issues of the Sri Lankan Journal of Applied Statistics that is brought out by the Institute of Applied Statistics Sri Lanka.
Jun Yan and his wife, Jiafeng Sun, welcomed their long-awaited daughter, Jolin Yan, on July 31, 2013. She weighed 8 pounds and 3 ounces and was 20 inches long. Her head measured 35 cm. She patiently waited until her auntie had arrived to assist on the afternoon of July 30 before signaling her arrival process later in the evening. She was delivered the next morning in a record time in Jun’s family, 20 minutes, right on her due date.
Lynn Kuo and Rick Vitale were both honored for 25 years at UConn.
Alexander Tartakovsky is welcomed to the department as a Full Professor.
Haim Bar is welcomed to the department as an Assistant Professor.
Kun Chen is welcomed to the department as an Assistant Professor.
A Musical ProgProgramram in Greater Hartford
BBByBy Nitis Mukhopadhyay
During October 19-21, 2012, the Bengali Association of Greater Hartford (BAGH) of Connecticut, a non-profit and non-taxable cultural association, held its Dutga Puja celebration. This religious and social celebration is one of the biggest one that continues to be celebrated all over India. In many parts of India, the same holy period is celebrated as what is known as Navraatri covering nine days and nights of this high-holiday season which ends with Durga Puja and a feast.
The Supreme Goddess Durga is worshipped to gain courage, strength, success, prosperity, humility, happiness and health for all on this universe. Devotees and friends and families of all faith, belief, color, race, and ethnicity from both far and near feel free to gather around to pray to the Almighty and then have a great time with traditional Indian music and cuisine.
48
From left to right: Dr. Saumitra Banerjee on tabla, Nitis, Mahua, and Swarnali, followed by two other performers, Ms. Koel Khan and Ms. Baishali Kanjilal (both UConn-Storrs graduate students). October 20, 2012.
On Saturday, October 20, 2012, Professor Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Mrs. Mahua Mikhopadhyay, and Ms. Swarnali Banerjee performed traditional vocal renditions for a crowd 400+ strong under the direction of Mrs. Mukhopadhyay. Traditionally, all musicians are seated with legs folded and they stay seated throughout a performance. An uninitiated may think of this seating as a challenge on one’s back as well as the knees! The recital was a big success.
Nitis and Mahua singing a duet. October 20, 2012.
49
Alumni News
Debanjan Bhattacharjee (Ph.D. 2011) made a full-length invited paper presentation during the IWAP held in Jerusalem, Israel in June 2012 and chaired an invited paper session during the 4th IWSM hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens in July 2013.
Madhuja Mallick (Ph.D. 2004) has joined Forest Laboratories, Inc. in New York.
Patrick Cantwell (Ph.D. 1987) became an American Statistical Association Fellow.
Sujut Ghosh (Ph.D. 1996) became a National Science Foundation Program Director.
Saibal Chattopadhyay (Ph.D. 1993), Professor, was appointed to the highly prestigious position of The Director at the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta in Calcutta, India, effective April 2013.
Sujay Datta (Ph.D. 1995) presented a contributed paper at the Joint Statistical Meetings in Montreal, Canada in August 2013.
Feng Guo (Ph.D. Statistics, 2007, Transportation. 2010) has received his tenure with promotion to Associate Professsor in the Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia.
Elijah Gaoioni (Ph.D. 2009) has joined New York Life Insurance Company as a Corporate Vice President, Data Science.
Sourish Das (Ph.D. 2008) has joined Chennai Mathematical Institute, India, as an Assistant Professor.
Ulysses Dira (Ph.D. 2006) has joined Astra Zeneca as a Principal Statistician.
Sankha Muthu Poruthotage (Ph.D. 2013) has joined Plymouth Insurance, Boston, Massachusetts, effective September 1, 2013.
Gong-Yi Liao (Ph.D. 2013) is employed by the Northern Trust Company.
Jennifer Boyko (Ph.D. 2013) has joined Boehringer-Ingelheim.
50 Tumulesh K. S. Solanky (Ph.D. 1990), Professor and Head, made a full-length invited paper presentation and chaired an invited paper session during the 4 th IWSM hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens, July 2013.
Bhargab Chattopadhyay (Ph.D. 2012) made full-length invited paper presentation during the IWAP held in Jerusalem, Israel in June 2012 and chaired an invited paper session during the 4 th IWSM hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens in July 2013.
Junfeng Lin (Ph.D. 2003) is a consultant to GCE Solutions, Inc. in Bloomington, Illinois.
Xun Jiang (Ph.D. May 2013) has joined Amgen Biopharmaceutical Company, in Thousand Oaks, California, as a biostatistician.
Ziwen Wei (Ph.D. 2012) is employed at Merck & Co., Inc.
Rui Wu (Ph.D. 2012) is employed at Novartis Oncology.
Leo Wang (Ph.D. August 2013) has joined Barclay’s in New York City as an Assistant Vice President.
Steven Chiou (Ph.D. May 2013) has joined the University of Minnesota in Duluth as an Assistant Professor.
Sairam Rayaprolu (Ph.D. August 2013) has joined Disney as a Decision Science Consultant in Orland, Florida.
Ashok Chaurasia (Ph.D. August 2013) is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in Bethesda, Maryland.
Shan Hu (Ph.D. 2012) has been promoted to Predictive Modeler II at Plymouth Rock Insurance in Boston, Massachusetts.
Jieyang Zang (MS 2012) is a Customer Data Analyst at Symphony EYC.
Gulsum Cinar Dolgun (MS 2013) is an Expert Assistant at TCMB.
Enida Halilovic (MS 2013) is an IT Project Analyst for United Health Care insurance company.
Qi Liao (MS 2013) is a Statistician at Merkle.
Xue Liu (MS 2013) has joined Towers Watson as an Actuarial Analyst.
51
Yue Wang (MS 2013) is working for Aetna Insurance Company as an Analyst.
Zhuping Liu (MS 2012) is pursuing a Ph.D. at the University of Texas-Austin in Marketing.
Pantea Alirezazadeh (MS 2012) is an Analyst for 1010 Data.
Hui Yao (MS 2012) is a Senior Predictive Modeler at Ernst & Young.
Stephen O’Malley (MS 2005) is an Analytics Manager at Health Dialog.
Kishori Donwar (MS 2007) is working for KPMG Derivatives as a Valuation Specialist.
Wen Cao (MS 2012) is a student at the NYU Stern School of Business in New York City.
Madhuja Mallick (Ph.D. 2004) is an Associate Director at Forest Laboratories, Inc.
Student News
Swarnali Banerjee (Adv. Mukhopadhyay), made full-length invited paper presentations during the IWAP held in Jerusalem, Israel in June 2012 and during the 4 th IWSM hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens in July 2013. She also presented a contributed paper at the Joint Statistical Meetings in Montreal, Canada in August 2013.
Sankha Muthu Poruthotage (Ph.D., August 2013, Adv. Mukhopadhyay) made a full-length invited paper presentations during the 4 th IWSM hosted by the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia-Athens in July 2013 and during NESS held at UConn-Storrs in April 2013.
Gyuhyeong Goh (Adv. Dey) was supported to attend the 2012 SAMSI/CRSC Industrial Math/Stat Modeling Workshop for Graduate Students at North Carolina State University, July 16-24, 2012. He received the 2013 IBM Student Award at the 27 th New England Statistical Symposium at the Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, Storrs on April 27, 2013. He also received The Gottfried Noether Award from the Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, Storrs in December 2012.
Chantal Larose (Adv. Dey and Harel) published the book by Larose, D. and Larose, C. Discovering Knowledge in Data: An Introduction to Data Mining , Second Edition. John Wiley and Sons, New York, 2014. Her professional activity includes Webmaster for the ASA Connecticut Chapter. She was the co-winner of the American Statistical Association Connecticut Chapter Mini-Conference poster competition, March 27, 2013. Chantal also gave the following
52 presentations along with Drs. Ofer Harel and Jun Yan: “How to Compare Nested Regression Models in Incomplete Data.” Contributed talk at Women in Mathematics in New England, September 2012; “Comparing Regression Coefficients using Incomplete Data.” Contributed poster at American Statistical Association Connecticut Chapter Mini-Conference, March 2013 and at the New England Statistical Symposium, April 2013; (with Harel, O. and Dey, D.) “Approaches to Multiple Imputation in the N < P Problem.” Invited talk at Modern Modeling Methods 2013, University of Connecticut, May 2013.
Dooti Roy (Adv. Dey) was supported by Cigna Analytics as a research assistant to work predictive modeling for prescription drugs. For more information, visit: http://today.uconn.edu/blog/2013/02/uconn-and-cigna-team-up-for-health-care-research/
Dr. Carlos Antonio Abante Valle, from Federal University of Rio de Janiero, Brazil, completed his visiting research fellowship under the supervision of Professor Dey.
Dr. Vicente Cancho Gariby, from University of Sao Paulo, Sao Carlos, Brazil, completed his visiting research fellowship under the supervision of Professor Dey.
Dr. Gladys Barriga, from Federal University of Sao Paulo, Sao Carlos, Brazil, completed her visiting research fellowship under the supervision of Professor Dey.
Ashok Chaurasia and Jennifer Boyko were elected to the University of Connecticut chapter of The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, the nation’s oldest, most selective, and most prestigious all-discipline honor society.
Valerie Pare (Adv. Harel) won the Institute of Teaching and Learning’s 2013-2014 Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award.
James Anderson and Lilian Cheung , Statistics majors, jointly presented a poster at the Sixteenth Annual Frontiers in Undergraduate Research Poster Exhibition in April 2013.
Danjie Zhang (Adv. Chen) received the ASA Biopharmaceutical Section Student Paper Award at the ICSA/ISBS 2013 Joint Conference in 2013.
SAMSI Undergraduate SeminarSeminar:::: Applications of Uncertainty Quantification James Anderson Statistics Major, Class of 2013:
This February I had the opportunity to attend a workshop at SAMSI. It was a bit daunting at first, because I’d never done anything similar, but it turned out to be a great experience. Most
53 notably, the material the presenters delivered was varied in subject matter, from biology to warfare, and quite intriguing. I was also impressed by how quickly and clearly the presenters were able to get to the heart of their work while still including a good amount of background information on their techniques and projects. This really added context and meaning to the transition between academics and applications. One thing I appreciated especially was that the information was usually presented in an attempt to engage all the different academic backgrounds. And as one of the youngest attendees, I really noticed that the SAMSI staff was in no hurry to leave anyone behind. On the first day, we ate dinner with the presenters. They were eager to talk more about their work or answer any sort of question about schools or jobs or conferences or anything else. It was nice for me, who has only been exposed to the academic side, to not only learn about the things I might be doing in the future, but also hearing, from people who have made the transition already, about how to go about getting there, all in what felt like a peer to peer environment. Overall it was a very encouraging experience that reaffirmed my direction.
Lilian Cheung Mathematics-Statistics Major, Class of 2014:
My first taste of undergraduate research in statistics came shortly after I completed my sophomore year. Last May, I attended a weeklong undergraduate workshop at SAMSI and NCSU on Uncertainty Quantification. Over the course of that week, the workshop touched upon a wide range of topics. We discussed the application of uncertainty quantification techniques to controlling the Mars rover; our capstone project involved a model for the displacement of automobile drivers.
Later that year, I joined a group of students researching the application of estimating equations to various statistical models. Under the guidance of our professor and mentor, Professor Nalini Ravishanker, we discussed the methodology of estimating equations as well as applications of the approach to financial datasets. One highlight of my undergraduate research experience was presenting my work-in-progress at the UNCG Regional Mathematics and Statistics Conference. The following semester, I had the opportunity to present a poster with James Anderson at the FURASH and NESS conferences at UConn. I vividly remember walking around each of the conferences and listening to the research conducted by other students: The breadth of topics astounded me. Some students focused on real-world applications of statistical techniques: For example, weather forecasting and the spread of disease. Others explored and built upon the underlying mathematical theories behind statistical methods.
What I remember most from my experiences are the people I talked to and the advice I received. Every workshop and conference I attended was well organized, and at each event, I met a dedicated community of students and faculty willing to share their expertise. Undergraduate research has undoubtedly enriched my undergraduate experience at UConn.
54 A Birthday Party at JSM 2013
Karthik Bharath, Ph.D. 2012 Ohio State University
JSM 2013 at Montreal provided at least two reasons to celebrate for people involved with the Statistics department at UConn: A special session on Bayesian modeling was arranged in honor of Professor Dipak Dey's 60th birthday by his former student Xia Wang (University of Cincinnati); this was followed by a memorable dinner party attended by a smattering of Prof Dey's former students, colleagues, teachers and his advisor Professor James Berger (Duke University). The special session in his honor, held on Sunday Aug 4, comprised of 4 speakers who had been advised by Prof Dey: Seongho Song from the University of Cincinnati, Karthik Bharath from the Ohio State University, Victor Hugo from Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brazil (postdoc under Prof Dey) and Xia Wang. The topics of the talks reflected on Prof Dey's research interests spanning over a couple of decades in Bayesian methodology ranging from linear and non-linear mixed effects models to model selection. The session was well attended by several of his former students and colleagues from around the world.
The dinner party, organized by Xia Wang and Seongho Song, held on Aug 6 was a resounding success and was attended by several of Prof Dey's formers students and a few `celebrities' within the statistics community. Prof Malay Ghosh, from Univeristy of Florida and accompanied by his wife, reminisced about the time when he taught Prof Dey at ISI, Kolkata; Prof Dey's advisor, Prof Jim Berger offered a heartfelt toast in honor of Prof Dey and his wife Rita and spoke lovingly about their time together at Stanford towards the end of Prof Dey's PhD and also enumerated some of his achievements; Professor Sudipto Banerjee from the University of Minnesota, who graduated from UConn, spoke nostalgically of his time as a graduate student in the department and his repeated duels with Prof Dey in table tennis; Professor Dongchu Sun, who is Prof Dey's academic brother and Chair of the department of Statistics at the University of Missouri, Columbia, offered his congratulations and spoke fondly of their time together in various places. The highlight of the dinner party was the presence of Professor Susie Bayarri from Universitat de Valencia, Spain, despite very recently having had a brain surgery, and the presentation of a poster containing the academic genealogy of Prof Dey comprising of his predecessors and his students and their students. All in all, it was a joyous evening, brimming with reminiscences and nostalgia associated with Prof Dey and his former students and colleagues.
55
Left to right: Y. Chung, E. Gainie, S. Song, K. Bharath, D. Dey, R. Dey, X. Wang, S. Huartado, F. Guo
Recent Ph.D.’s
Rui Wu, Ph.D., 2012 Sy Han (Steven) Chiou, Ph.D., 2013 Xun (Tony) Jiang, Ph.D., 2013 Jennifer Boyko, Ph.D., 2013 Gong-Yi Laio, Ph.D., 2013 Sairam Rayaprolu, Ph.D., 2013 Sankha Viran Muthu Poruthotage, Ph.D., 2013 Ashok Chaurasia, Ph.D., 2013 Xiao (Leo) Wang, Ph.D., 2013
Recent MasterMaster’’’’ssss
Taylor Brown, Wen Cao, Shang-Poa Chang, Xiu Chen, Yukai Chen, Gulsum Cinar Dolgun, Enida Halilovic, Yu Ji, Jingwei Jin, Jia Li, Qi Liao, Xue Liu, Yicheng Lu, Qiankun Shi, Erkuan Wang, Jun Xu, Xing Yang, Xuezhi Zhang
Recent BachelorBachelor’’’’ssss
James Anderson III, Kierstin Arvelo, Katherine Bosshart, Cara Brouillard, Michael Byram, Steven Calderbank, Matthew Delmonte, Marc Demattie, Bryant Dominguez, Kelly Duda, Katelyn Fleming, Liam Haller, Jake Hollaron, Tyler Larrivee, Lisa Lee, Melissa Mackie, Waseem Mehar, Shane Mitchell, Nicholas Morena, James Nitz, Stephen Plesko, Salvatore Rapisarldi, Emily Robertson, Jennifer Shumway, Zachary Shuskus, Jessica Smith, Emily Turcan, Tyler Walters, Michael Xu, Junjing Zhu
56 Faculty, Staff and Adjunct Faculty
Robert Apruzese, Adjunct Lecturer [email protected] Haim Bar, Assistant Professor [email protected] Richard Bass, Professor (Math, joint appointment) [email protected] Tracy Burke, Secretary [email protected] Joseph Cappelleri, Adjunct Professor (Pfizer) [email protected] Kun Chen, Assistant Professor [email protected] Ming-Hui Chen, Professor [email protected] Zhiyi Chi, Professor and Associate Head [email protected] William Congero, Adjunct Lecturer [email protected] Dipak K. Dey, Professor and Associate Dean [email protected] Evarist Giné, Professor and Head (Math, joint appointment) [email protected] Joseph Glaz, Professor and Head [email protected] Ofer Harel, Associate Professor [email protected] Brian Hartman, Assistant Professor (Math, joint appointment) [email protected] Kent Holsinger, Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (EEB, joint appointment) [email protected] Tania Huedo-Medina, Assistant Professor (Allied Health, joint appointment) [email protected] Sangwook Kang, Assistant Professor [email protected] Lynn Kuo, Professor [email protected] Suman Majumdar, Associate Professor (Stamford) [email protected] Kate McLaughlin, Adjunct Lecturer [email protected] Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Professor [email protected] Megan Petsa, Program Assistant [email protected] Vladimir Pozdnyakov, Associate Professor (Hartford) [email protected] Nalini Ravishanker, Professor [email protected] Alexander Tartakovsky, Professor [email protected] Naitee Ting, Adjunct Professor (Boehringer-Ingelheim) [email protected] Richard Vitale, Professor [email protected] Stephen Walsh, Associate Professor (School of Nursing, joint appointment) [email protected] Xiaojing Wang, Assistant Professor [email protected] Jun Yan, Associate Professor [email protected]
57 Alumni Reply Form
Please complete and return this form for our alumni files. Include news (professional and/or personal) of your current activities, or suggestions for the next issue of our newsletter. Mail it to Megan Petsa, Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, 215 Glenbrook Road, U-4120, Storrs, CT 06269-4120 or fax it to (860) 486-4113.
Name ______Degree(s) and year(s) ______
Residence______Home Phone______
City, State, Zip______
Position ______
Business Address ______
City, State, Zip ______
Business Phone ______Fax Number______
Personal/Business E-Mail Address(es) ______
Please include some information about yourself: (unless you request otherwise, we would like to share this information in future Newsletters.) The Department welcomes suggestions for future newsletters. Please feel free to e-mail us at [email protected]. The University of Connecticut, Department of Statistics website address is http://www.stat.uconn.edu and phone number is (860) 486-3414.
58