Volume 38 • Issue 8 IMS Bulletin October 2009 The IMS: Products and Processes CONTENTS The new IMS President, 1 The IMS: Products and Mike Steele, looks into Processes what goes on behind the scenes to create 2–4 Members’ News: Ram Gnanadesikan; Vijay Nair; one of the key IMS John Rolph; Alice Guionnet; products. Xihong Lin; Don Truax; Regular readers of the Nancy Geller; Laurent IMS Bulletin have their Mazliak; Glenn Shafer; favorite sections, and I Bradley Tice have two: Terry Speed’s 6–7 Nominations; SAMSI news eclectic “Stuff” and 8 IMS Monographs and IMS Rick Durrett’s almost Textbooks politically correct The troika of IMS Presidents: current President Mike Steele (right), with “Ramblings.” Their 9 Council meeting report; President-Elect Peter Hall (left) and Past President Nanny Wermuth (center) Special Invited Lecturers pieces often make me think about the aims and achievements subtle, and, even after serving in many 10 JSM photos of the IMS. In this piece, and any others IMS positions, I still find surprises. In my 12 COPSS Awards that I may do during the year, I hope to Bulletin pieces I hope to explore a few of 15 Rick’s Ramblings: How to tap into the thoughtfulness that Terry and these behind-the-scenes processes, and give a 20-minute talk Rick regularly evoke. for starters, I’ll look at one of the most As background, I should confess that complicated: what it takes for the Annals 16 Obituaries: Robin Plackett; Ashok Maitra I came into the academic world as a of Statistics to be published. probabilist, with only a smidgen of early The high beams naturally focus on 18 Meeting reports statistical exposure. Still, after thirty-four the editors, currently Susan Murphy and 20 Terence’s Stuff: Moments or so years in statistics departments, I Bernard Silverman. They are responsible have had their moment may now be as close as anyone to that for all communication to the authors 21 IMS meetings mythical beast, the IMS Minotaur—a about submissions, and they are ulti- creature that is half-probabilist and mately responsible for the scientific con- Other meetings 26 half-statistician. Also, after almost twenty tent of the Annals. Nevertheless, they also 29 Employment Opportunities years at the Wharton School of the have several background jobs. In particu- University of Pennsylvania, I have even lar, they must select and manage the asso- 31 International Calendar of Statistical Events started to feel comfortable with B-school ciate editors. These workhorses pull the concepts like the idea that one studies an editorial sleigh. They in turn select and 35 Information for Advertisers organization by examining its “products” manage referees for (almost) every article. 36 Kakuro corner and its “processes.” Given referee reports (good, bad, or ugly), Plainly, the core products of the IMS they then prepare a recommendation to are its publications and its meetings. The the editor. In normal circumstances, the Institute exists to provide these goods recommendations are followed, perhaps and services. The “processes” are more subject to a little wiggling. Continued on Page 5 IMS Bulletin 2 . IMS Bulletin Volume 38 . Issue 8 Volume 38 • Issue 8 October 2009 IMS members’ news ISSN 1544-1881 NISS presents 2009 Sacks Award to Ramanathan Gnanadesikan Contact information James Landwehr, chair of the Board of Trustees for the National Institute of Statistical IMS Bulletin Editor: Xuming He Sciences (NISS) announces that Ramanathan Gnanadesikan, retired statistician, is recipi- Assistant Editor: Tati Howell ent of the 2009 Jerome Sacks Award for Cross-Disciplinary Research. The award was Contributing Editors: Peter Bickel, Louis Chen, presented to Gnanadesikan at a NISS reception held August 3 at JSM in Washington DC. Rick Durrett, Nicole Lazar, Terry Speed The award, named in honor of Jerome (Jerry) Sacks, the founding director of NISS, was To contact the IMS Bulletin: established in 2000, to “recognize sustained, high-quality cross-dis- IMS Bulletin ciplinary research involving the statistical sciences,” that exemplifies 2 Lampern View, Uley, Dursley GL11 5TD the NISS role of identifying, catalyzing and fostering high-impact, UK cross-disciplinary research involving the statistical sciences. e [email protected] Gnanadesikan, a former president of IMS, is recognized for his pioneering work in multivariate data analysis,as well as helping To contact the IMS regarding your dues, people to recognize the importance and the central role of data in membership, subscriptions, orders or change of address: statistics. He worked at Bell Laboratories and Bellcore (now Telcordia Technologies) on IMS Dues and Subscriptions Office projects such as speaker recognition. Gnanadesikan has always been interested in helping 9650 Rockville Pike, Suite L2407A younger people to enter the field of statistics. He helped start a program for junior high Bethesda MD 20814-3998 school students to spend a summer at Bell Labs, and was also very involved with the IMS USA New Researchers Committee. Gnanadesikan was among a small group of statisticians who t 301.634.7029 pushed for the creation of a statistical institute focusing on cross-disciplinary issues, leading f 301.634.7099 directly to the establishment of NISS in 1990. e [email protected] Gnanadesikan’s name is added to a plaque, housed at NISS, that also lists previous recipients of the award. These include Elizabeth Thompson, Max Morris, Raymond To contact the IMS regarding any other matter, including advertising, copyright Carroll, Douglas Nychka, Jeff Wu, Adrian Raftery, Cliff Spiegelman and John Rice. permission, offprint orders, copyright “This award is particularly meaningful to me since I have known Jerry Sacks from his transfer, societal matters, meetings, fellows early career days as a faculty member at Columbia University in the late 1950s,” comments nominations and content of publications: Gnanadesikan. “I am deeply honored to join the group of outstanding people who have Executive Director, Elyse Gustafson IMS Business Office received this award in past years.” PO Box 22718 Beachwood NISS 2009 Distinguished Service Awards presented to Vijay Nair and John Rolph OH 44122 USA Vijay Nair and John Rolph are the recipients of this year’s NISS Distinguished Service t 216.295.2340 Awards. The awards were presented by Alan Karr, director of NISS, at the NISS/SAMSI f 216.295.5661 reception at JSM in Washington DC. The awards, established in 2005, recognize individu- e [email protected] als who have given extraordinary service that significantly advances NISS and its mission. As Karr put it, “These are people who didn’t have to do what they did for NISS, but did it Executive Committee because they believe in NISS and what it does to serve the statistics community.” President: J. Michael Steele Nair is professor of statistics and industrial engineering at the University of Michigan. [email protected] His award honors his service as the chair of the Board of Trustees from 2004 to 2008, his President-Elect: Peter Hall [email protected] role in development of the 2004 strategic vision, leading the 2007 strategic positioning Past President: Nanny Wermuth study and his leadership during most of the building addition project. [email protected] The award to Rolph, who is professor of business and law at the University of Southern Treasurer: Rong Chen California, recognizes his service to NISS as a long-term member of the Board of Trustees [email protected] and his leadership within the Board, including having chaired the Science Committee, and Program Secretary: Guenther Walther [email protected] chairing the Finance Committee throughout the building addition project. Executive Secretary: Marten Wegkamp Nair and Rolph will have their names added to a plaque at NISS that honors all 12 [email protected] recipients to date of the award. IMS Editors October . 2009 IMS Bulletin . 3 IMS Journals and Publications Annals of Statistics: Susan Murphy & Bernard Silverman http://imstat.org/aos Annals of Applied Statistics: Bradley Efron, Stephen Fienberg, Michael Newton & Michael Stein Alice Guionnet receives Loève Prize http://imstat.org/aoas Annals of Probability: Ofer Zeitouni The 2009 Line and Michel Loève International Prize in Probability http://imstat.org/aop is awarded to Alice Guionnet of the École Normale Supérieure de Annals of Applied Probability: Yuval Peres Lyon. The prize, which carries a monetary award of $30,000, will http://imstat.org/aap Statistical Science: David Madigan be presented at a ceremony in Berkeley in October 2009. http://imstat.org/sts Alice received her PhD in 1995, advised by Gerard Ben Arous. IMS Lecture Notes – Monograph Series: Anirban DasGupta Her thesis dealt with Langevin dynamics in the Sherrington- http://imstat.org/publications/lecnotes.htm IMS Collections: Anirban DasGupta Kirkpatrick model of spin glasses, via a large deviations approach. http://imstat.org/publications/ The study of dynamics for complex systems (spin systems, particle approximations to the imscollections.htm nonlinear filtering equations and spin glasses, where logarithmic Sobolev inequalities in NSF-CBMS Regional Conference Series in Probability and Statistics: http://imstat.org/publications/nsf.htm particular and concentration of measure methods in general are very relevant), and more specifically the study of aging phenomena, continue to be a component of her research to IMS Co-sponsored Journals and Publications this day, with important collaborations with Zegarlinsky, Ben Arous,