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  • 17 Nov 2023 2:09 PM | Megan Othus (Administrator)

    Thank you to everyone who participated in the WNAR election for 2024 positions.


    Congratulations to WNAR President-Elect David Rocke, Program Coordinator Wen Zhou, and Representatives-at-Large Lindsay Renfro and Marie Auger-Methe.


    Special thanks go out to outgoing WNAR Past-President Gary Chan, Program Coordinator Lingling An, and outgoing Representatives-at-Large Charlotte Gard and Julia Palacios for their efforts and dedication to WNAR.

  • 14 Jul 2023 2:51 PM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    Congratulations to the 25 students who participated in the 2023 WNAR Student Award Competition, and to our winners of the written paper and oral presentations:


    WINNER PAPER AWARD

    Soumik Purkayastha, University of Michigan, Asymmetric Predictability: an information theoretic approach to causal inference

     

    RUNNER UP PAPER AWARD

    Norihiro Suzuki, Tokyo Medical University, A New Criterion for Determining a Cutoff Value Based on the Biases of the Incidence Proportions in the Presence of Outcome Misclassifications

     

    WINNER PRESENTATION AWARD

    Michael Christensen, Duke University, A Dynamic Model Characterizing Bird Migration

     

    RUNNERS UP PRESENTATION AWARD

    Elizabeth Wynn, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Simulating Longitudinal Single-cell RNA Sequencing Data

    Seth Temple, University of Washington, Robust statistical inference for very recent and strong incomplete selective sweeps

    Soumik Purkayastha, University of Michigan, Asymmetric Predictability: an information theoretic approach to causal inference


    The students were honored at the banquet at the 2023 WNAR Annual Meeting in Anchorage, Alaska. All WNAR participants received travel awards, and winners received additional monetary awards and certificates. We give special thanks to the chair of the student paper competition, Charlotte Gard of New Mexico State University, and the judges on the committee who read papers and observed oral presentations: Fang Chen (SAS); Shuai Chen (University of California, Davis); Chad He (Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center); Alexander Kaizer (Colorado School of Public Health); Eric Kawaguchi (University of Southern California); Kayleigh Keller (Colorado State University); Jane Lange (Oregon Health & Science University); Hong Li (University of California, Davis); Yu-Ru Su (Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute); Brandie Wagner (Colorado School of Public Health); Brian Williamson (Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute); Katie Wilson (University of Washington); Shangyuan Ye (Oregon Health & Science University); Guo Yu (University of California, Santa Barbara); Qian Zhao (Stanford University).


    Please encourage your students to participate in the competition in 2024! Abstracts and papers will be due in the late winter. More information can be found on the Student Paper Award website.

  • 19 Jun 2023 4:04 PM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    On behalf of WNAR and the WNAR Award Committee, we would like to congratulate Steve Horvath as the recipient of the 2023 WNAR Outstanding Impact Award and Lectureship. Congratulations, Dr. Horvath!


    The WNAR of IBS Outstanding impact and Lectureship Award was established in 2021 to recognize an outstanding individual or team, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality or citizenship, who has made a significant impact on our society through service and/or research in the development and application of statistical, mathematical, and data science theory and methods in the biomedical or environmental sciences. A significant impact can comprise either a single contribution of extraordinary merit or an outstanding aggregate of contributions that significantly impacts to biosciences and environmental sciences. 

    Dr. Steve Horvath is a Principal Investigator at the Altos Labs San Diego Institute of Science. Prior to joining Altos, he was a Professor of Human Genetics and Biostatistics at UCLA. Dr. Horvath’s nomination package clearly demonstrated his highly impactful research contributions to the fields of bioinformatics and aging biology, especially for his development of the widely used weighted correlation network analysis (WGCNA) method for studying biological networks and for his revolutionary development of the highly accurate and widely used epigenetic clocks, also known as Horvath’s clocks, for age estimation based on DNA methylation data. WNAR is very proud of its outstanding members, represented by Dr. Horvath.


    Congratulations as well to our other nominees, all of whom were outstanding and highly impressive in their contributions.


    As a recipient of the award, Dr. Horvath will give a talk in the WNAR Outstanding Impact Award Lecture at the JSM on Tuesday, August 8, 2023, 2pm. More information about the lecture can be found below. 

    WNAR members, please plan to submit nomination materials for next year’s award. We look forward to recognizing our outstanding members with this honor. More information about the award process can be found on the WNAR award website.


    WNAR Outstanding Impact Award Lecture at the JSM

    Session 1287 August 8, 2:00-3:50PM
    Title:   Epigenetic Clocks and Weighted Correlation Network Analysis

    Speaker: Steve Horvath (Department of Biostatistics, University of California, Los Angeles; Altos Labs)


    Abstract:   In this presentation, I will discuss two prevalent techniques employed in biostatistics and bioinformatics. First, I will provide an overview of weighted correlation network analysis (WGCNA), a systems biology approach used to delineate correlation patterns among variables. WGCNA enables the identification of clusters (modules) of highly correlated genes, the summarization of these clusters via module eigengene or intramodular hub gene, the establishment of relationships between modules and external sample traits (utilizing eigengene network methodology), and the computation of module membership measures. These techniques have proven successful across various biological contexts. Specifically, I will discuss a recent application of WGCNA to cytosine methylation data gathered by the Mammalian Methylation Consortium.


    The second method discussed is referred to as epigenetic clocks, which serve as genomic aging indicators based on cytosine methylation patterns. I will outline three successive generations of epigenetic clocks that are designed to predict age in humans, assess human mortality risk, and estimate age across various mammalian species, respectively.


    Dr. Horvath and WNAR President Elizabeth Juarez-Colunga at the JSM session, August 2023



  • 31 Oct 2022 3:49 PM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    Thank you to everyone who participated in the WNAR election for 2023 positions.


    Congratulations to WNAR President-Elect Megan Othus, Treasurer Brandie Wagner, and Regional Committee Representatives Natalie Gasca and Yu-Ru Su.


    Special thanks go out to outgoing WNAR Past-President Laura Cowen and outgoing Regional Committee Representatives Lisa Brown and Karen Messer for their efforts and dedication to WNAR.


    All current officers and positions are listed on the WNAR Leadership page.


  • 30 Aug 2022 9:01 AM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    Save the date for future WNAR meetings. More information will be added to the Meetings page.

    • June 18-21, 2023, Anchorage, Alaska

      • Scientific program chair: Audrey Hendricks, University of Colorado Denver
      • Local organizer: Jiaqi Huang, Alaska Department of Fish and Game

      • Chair of Student Award Committee: Charlotte Gard, New Mexico State University
    • June 9-12, 2024, Fort Collins, Colorado, joint with the Graybill Conference

      • Local organizer: Rick Zhou, Colorado State University


  • 17 Jun 2022 9:41 AM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    Forty-two students participated in the student paper competition at the 2022 WNAR/IMS conference (virtually).


    There were two winners (tied) in the written category: Anna Neufeld, University of Washington ("Inference after latent variable estimation for single-cell RNA sequencing data") and Shuting Shen, Harvard University ("Fast distributed Principal Component Analysis for large scale federated data").


    There were also two winners (tied) in the oral category: Larry Han, Harvard University ("Privacy-preserving and communication-efficient causal inference for hospital quality measurement") and Tianyu Zhang, University of Washington, ("Regression in Tensor Product Spaces by the Method of Sieves").


    The students were honored at special zoom event and awardees will receive certificates and monetary awards. We give a special thanks to the chair of the student paper competition, Fan Yang, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, and the rest of the committee: Jarrett Barber, Fei Gao, Joshua Keller, Lihua Lei, John Rice, Subodh Selukar, Krithika Suresh, Katherine Wilson, Fan Xia, Fuyong Xing, Fan Yang, Ting Ye, Ying Zhou.


    Congratulations to all!

  • 15 Jun 2022 12:04 PM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    On behalf of WNAR and the WNAR Award Committee, we would like to congratulate Dr. Bin Yu of UC Berkeley, the recipient of the inaugural WNAR Outstanding Impact Award and Lectureship. Congratulations, Dr. Yu!


    The WNAR of IBS Outstanding impact and Lectureship Award was established in 2021 to recognize an outstanding individual or team, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality or citizenship, who has made a significant impact on our society through service and/or research in the development and application of statistical, mathematical, and data science theory and methods in the biomedical or environmental sciences. A significant impact can comprise either a single contribution of extraordinary merit or an outstanding aggregate of contributions that significantly impacts to biosciences and environmental sciences. 

    Dr. Bin Yu is the Chancellor’s Distinguished Professor and Class of 1936 Second Chair in the Departments of Statistics and Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at UC Berkeley. Dr Yu’s nomination package clearly demonstrated her fundamental contributions in both statistical theory and practice, which has lasting impacts across the fields of statistics and interdisciplinary domains; her high visible role model, especially for women researchers in multiple disciplines; and her outstanding leadership in professional and community services that positively influenced advancement in and recognition of Biometrics. WNAR is very proud of its outstanding members, represented by Dr. Yu.


    Congratulations as well to our other nominees, all of whom were outstanding and highly impressive in their contributions.


    As a recipient of the award, Dr. Yu will give a talk in the WNAR Outstanding Impact Award Lecture at the JSM on Monday, August 8, 2022, 10:30. More information about the lecture can be found below.

    WNAR members, please plan to submit nomination materials for next year’s award. We look forward to recognizing our outstanding members with this honor. More information about the award process can be found on the WNAR award website.


    WNAR Outstanding Impact Award Lecture at the JSM


    Session 121, Monday Aug 8, 10:30am-12:20pm
    Title:  Principles for Impactful Data Science and Statistics: Lessons Learned from Covid-19 Forecasting and Beyond

    Speaker: Bin Yu (University of California, Berkeley)
    Panel on impactful research with panelists
    Amy Braverman (JPL), Ying Lu (Stanford), Marc Suchard (UCLA), Katerina Kechris (Univ of Colorado, Denver), Bin Yu (UC Berkeley), and Hongyu Zhao (Yale)

    Abstract:

    Impactful data science or statistical research outside statistics is a professional responsibility of statistics as a field and a necessity for its prosperity and funding.  In this talk, we distill principles out of the Yu Group’s experience in Spring 2020, when a 12-person rapid-response team used skills of data science/statistics and beyond to help distribute Covid PPE.  These principles are useful in general to ensure that our data science and statistics work be impactful in domain fields and society at large.

     

    A data science process towards impact includes tapping into domain knowledge (about epidemiology and medical logistics chains in the covid forecasting project), collecting or curating a relevant data repository, developing models relevant for solving the domain problem (for short-term county-level death forecasting in the US in the covid project), and building an accessible platform for sharing visualization (AI machine website in the covid project). Finally, we emphasize dealing with problems that require rapid response, often resembling agile software development.



  • 17 Dec 2021 5:45 PM | Megan Othus (Administrator)

    Thank you to everyone who participated in the WNAR election.


    Congratulations to WNAR President-Elect Elizabeth Juarez-Colunga, Program Coordinator Lingling An, and Regional Committee Representatives Ting Ye and Yiliang Zhu.


    Special thanks go out to outgoing WNAR Past-President Ying Lu and outgoing Regional Committee Representative Katie Kerr for their efforts and dedication to WNAR.


    Thank you to outgoing Secretary/Correspondent Megan Othus for her decade of extraordinary service to WNAR.

  • 01 Nov 2021 11:03 AM | Jessica Minnier (Administrator)

    WNAR has initiated an IBS/WNAR Impact Award and Lectureship for outstanding individuals or teams from the WNAR Region.  The inaugural call for nominations is now open, with a submission deadline of January 15, 2022.  

    Details can be found in the attached Call for Nominations and also within the WNAR Awards section of the website.


    The Lectureship will occur at JSM in August 2022.

  • 28 Apr 2021 1:27 PM | Megan Othus (Administrator)

    The Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS) condemns in the strongest possible terms all forms of racism and hate. The recent, horrendous event in Atlanta that targeted Asians and Americans of Asian ancestry in the United States is but one more manifestation of the systemic racism and exclusion that many of our colleagues and neighbors suffer routinely.


    The FBI reports that hate crimes in the United States are at their highest point in over a decade; similar statistics have been reported in Canada. Hate crimes are motivated by biases towards a person’s race, religion, sexual preference and other categories. Critically for us as statisticians, violence against targeted groups occurs when we fail to make our profession — and all of society — more diverse and inclusive. Through our skills in quantitative reasoning, we are best equipped to generate evidence on impacts of inherent biases on targeted groups so that informed actions are taken to prevent hate crimes.

    While Asian, Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) are not alone in terms of how frequently they are subjected to hate and prejudice, 2020 saw a sharp increase — as high as 150% relative to earlier years — in the number of crimes reported by AAPI persons. This is intolerable. COPSS, on behalf of its partner societies and all their members, stands firmly in support of all Asian, Asian Canadian, and Asian-American statisticians.

    As a profession, we have benefited from the many and important contributions of our AAPI colleagues. There is no question that the influx of talent from other nations, but particularly from Asian countries, has enabled the United States and Canada to sustain its leadership role in science, technology, and innovation. Science and technology are the engine that drives economic development and opens more opportunities for advancement in society.

    COPSS states in no uncertain terms that hate, prejudice, and exclusion have no place in any of its partner societies and will not be tolerated. We all need to do our part to build a more just society. COPSS has established a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Taskforce to develop strategies and activities to ensure that our profession is welcoming to all, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion and any other personal attributes. Furthermore, COPSS will continue to reflect on its own role in the perpetuation of any implicit biases against any member of our professional community by examining the fair representation of all deserving statisticians (including members of Asian and Pacific Islander descent) among recipients of COPSS awards, identifying any systematic underrepresentation or historical exclusion, and implementing more equitable solutions.

    We all need to do more to promote justice, fairness, and respect. Let us commit to doing everything we can to ensure that those values guide our profession. Please join COPSS in expressing its deepest appreciation to all its members in these difficult times and in expressing its solidarity with the entire Asian community, and especially our cherished members of Asian descent and their loved ones.

     

    *This statement was approved by leadership of all five COPSS societies.

    American Statistical Association (ASA)
    Eastern North American Region of the International Biometric Society (ENAR)
    Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS)
    Statistical Society of Canada/Société statistique du Canada (SSC)
    Western North American Region of the International Biometric Society (WNAR)

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