Biostatistician, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine Isaac Nuamah grew up in Kumasi, Ghana, and earned his Bachelor of Science degree in statistics from the University of Ghana. In high school, he was highly skilled at mathematics, which led him to statistics since he enjoyed the applied part as opposed to the more theoretical aspect of […]
Celebrating Black History Month
David H. Blackwell (1919–2010)
David Blackwell, a pioneering African American mathematician and statistician, made significant contributions to statistical decision theory and game theory, notably co-authoring Theory of Games and Statistical Decisions. He had an impactful career as a professor, researcher, and advocate for statistical methods, becoming the first African American elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
DeJuran Richardson
DeJuran Richardson was pursuing a purely mathematical path of study when, midway through graduate school, he was introduced to the biostatistics field by a chance stumble into a conference on sequential methods and testing in clinical trials.
Drake Gibson
Drake Gibson is a lifelong Prince George’s County, Maryland, resident who became passionate about data science after learning to program in R and Python in graduate school. While working at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, he took on projects that enhanced his knowledge—his colleagues noticed and encouraged him to apply to be a data scientist.
Jemar Bather
Jemar Bather is a senior scientist in biostatistics at Merck, where he applies his statistical expertise to develop new medications that enhance health outcomes for those affected by infectious diseases.
Lehana Thabane
Lehana Thabane was always fascinated by numbers and the information one can get from a single number. He took all the mathematics courses offered to him as an undergraduate. Then, when he ran out, he took statistics courses.
Kobi Abayomi
Kobi Abayomi once dreamed of becoming a physicist, but switched majors after he took his first class in statistics at Georgia Institute of Technology. Today, is head of science for Gumbel Demand Acceleration—a Software as a Service (SaaS) company for digital media—and Betaside Recordings, both data science startups at the intersection of demand and supply curves for musicians, artists, and music listeners. He also holds an appointment at Seton Hall University, where he teaches in the undergraduate and master’s in data science program.
Celebrating Black History Month 2024
In celebration of Black History Month, we recognize eight individuals from the Black/African American collective who have made contributions to the statistics field as mentors, professors, and entrepreneurs.
Christophe Toukam Tchakoute
Christophe Toukam Tchakoute grew up in Cameroon during the peak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, which is how he became interested in STEM. His interest was reinforced when he attended the University of Cape Town in South Africa and became curious about the chemistry and cell biology of HIV and how the virus can hijack the immune system for its own benefit. Consequently, he interned in the HIV/AIDS department at the World Health Organization and was introduced to epidemiology and biostatistics. He now works at Genentech and leverages statistics and real-world data to inform clinical trial design for different oncology programs.
Lloyd J. Edwards
Lloyd Edwards earned a master’s in mathematical statistics at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1982 and then worked for TRW Defense Systems for three years as a software engineer focusing on antisubmarine warfare. He graduated from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1990 with a PhD in biostatistics, leading to a career as a faculty member in the University of North Carolina Department of Biostatistics for close to 25 years. Since 2017, Edwards has been a professor in the department of biostatistics in the school of public health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.