The proposed Program Project, Statistical Informatics for Cancer Research, will tackle a wide range of challenging statistical problems based on the computationally-intensive analysis of large and complicated data sets. Among the types of datasets to be handled are large administrative databases for disease mapping and public health surveillance subject to spatial and temporal correlation and high dimensional datasets arising from genomics or proteomics studies in cancer epidemiology. The Statistical Computing Core will be responsible for supporting the computational needs of all Program investigators. Specifically, the Core will 1. advise Program investigators on computational aspects of their work; 2. provide educational tutorials and training as appropriate; 3. provide specialized advice and support in terms of Geographic Information Systems (CIS) and bioinformatics; 4. serve as a Liaison with the Information Technology Department at the Harvard School of Public Health to ensure that all Program investigators have adequate support through the School's high performance Linux cluster; 5. create and maintain a Program website; 6. work with Program investigators to take their prototype programs and turn them into flexible, efficient, robust, well-documented, and user-friendly R libraries that can be distributed through the online R archive, as well as via the Program website. Christopher Paciorek, Assistant Professor of Biostatistics at the Harvard School of Public Health, will serve as Core Director. Dr. Paciorek is an experienced programmer and received strong training in statistical computing during his doctoral studies at Carnegie Mellon University. Dr. Paciorek's own research interests are in computational methods, especially for spatio-temporal and Bayesian modeling. The Core will subcontract professional programming support from Battelle Memorial Institute. The Battelle group providing the support (Project Manager, Mr. Warren Strauss) has an outstanding track record with respect to providing such support, and we are confident that we have identified a high quality, cost-effective solution. The overall Program PI, Dr. Ryan, has a successful ongoing collaboration with this same group.
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