Advances throughout the medical and biological sciences rely to an increasing degree on the principles and methods of statistical analysis. A lab's ability to generate data often outpaces its ability to fully analyze that data;and this can negatively affect progress towards the next experiment. Being a science concerned with the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data itself, statistics will play a critical role in resolving the information bottleneck facing biomedical scientists. The research mission of our program is to pursue the most important problems at the interface between statistics and biomedical science - the problems of biostatistics.
The aims of our interdisciplinary training program are to recruit and provide pre-doctoral training in biostatistics to talented students who are interested in careers in biomedical science. The demand is high for scientists with this expertise. In contrast with traditional biostatistics training, the proposed program will emphasize and further support the interdisciplinary elements of biostatistical research. We request support in year one for four trainee slots, ramping up to eight in year five. The pre-doctoral trainees will engage in course work and lab rotations until suitably prepared for dissertation work. Through course work, pre-doctoral trainees will learn theoretical, methodological, and practical underpinnings of statistics, and also relevant topics in biology, bioinformatics, clinical investigation, population-based investigation, and the responsible conduct of research. In a novel lab rotation system, trainees will become familiar with the biomedical context surrounding active investigations. Those who succeed in the program will be well positioned for further success in academia, government or industry. Contributing to the program are leading research/training departments, a high level of collaborative research across many disciplines, and a proactive approach to increasing the domestic supply of undergraduates through summer internship programs. By our research we know that biostatistics has a critical role to play in modern biomedical science, and so we have designed an interdisciplinary training program to most effectively train the next generation of biostatisticians.
