UCLA Department of Statistics Seminar Series
Thu, 5/23/2013, 12:30 PM—1:30 PM
1425 Physics and Astronomy Bldg.
Abel Rodriguez
Applied Mathematics and Statistics
University of California - Santa Cruz
Modeling network- and array-valued data through nonparametric Bayesian mixtures: applications and extensions
We discuss the use of nonparametric mixture models to create models for array-valued data, with a particular emphasis on networks. The talk is divided in three parts. We start by reviewing traditional stochastic blockmodels and discussing some of their properties. Then, we move on to discuss an application to financial trading networks (FTNs). FTNs have been gaining popularity as a tool to understand the microstructure of financial markets. The model we present, a hidden Markov model whose emission distributions correspond to stochastic blockmodels, is capable of detecting changes in market microstructure and of predicting future network structure. Finally, we circle back to the problem of constructing stochastic blockmodels and discuss some of our ongoing work on building more flexible and interpretable models priors. This is joint work with Brenda Betancourt (UCSC) and Perla Reyes (Kansas State).
Tenure Track Professor
Open-ranked tenured and tenure track position, joint in the Department of Statistics and a department or departments in the Division of Social Sciences at the University of California, Los Angeles. We seek a faculty member contributing at the cutting edge to the development of statistical methodology relevant to the social sciences. We welcome candidates whose experience in teaching, research or community service has prepared them to contribute to our commitment to diversity and excellence. Duties include new course development, teaching, and methodological and collaborative research. Ph.D. required by date of anticipated appointment of July 1, 2013. Salary will be commensurate with education and experience. Please refer to Tracking Job #1015-1213-01 on all correspondence.
Reviews for the position begin October 1, 2012, and will continue until the position is filled. Interested applicants should send a letter describing how their qualifications and interests would fit with the position description, along with their curriculum vitae, research statement, and teaching statement to:
Professor Mark S. Handcock
Chair, Social Statistics Recruitment Committee
Department of Statistics
University of California at Los Angeles
8125 Math Sciences Building
Box 951554
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1554
email: css@stat.ucla.edu
The applicants should arrange for three letters of recommendation to be sent to Professor Handcock.
For more information on the departments in the Division of Social Sciences see www.sscnet.ucla.edu.
UCLA is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer with a strong institutional commitment to excellence through diversity. Women and Minorities are especially encouraged to apply.
DataFest 2013 to be held at IPAM on April 19-21
DataFest 2013 will be held April 19-21 at IPAM on the UCLA campus. DataFest challenges teams of undergraduate students to make sense and find insight in a rich, complex data set that is unknown until the contest begins. At the end of the Fest, the teams have just 7 minutes to make their presentations to a panel of judges, and prizes are given for best visualization, best use of external data, and best insight.
This year promises to be bigger and better. We'll have undergraduate teams from UCLA, USC, Pomona College, and Cal State Long Beach and, potentially, surprise entertainment. The success of DataFest depends on our large group of enthusiastic Consultant volunteers. These consultants hang out for an hour or two (or more!) and talk to the student teams. Sometimes, they answer questions directly, othertimes, they point the teams towards resources that might help, or help the teams refine their strategies. Consulting is lots of fun, a good way to see what the undergraduates are thinking, and a great recruiting opportunity, if you're looking to hire some future statisticians.
If you're interested in contributing time, money, or swag (which we give away as prizes to keep the mood light), please contact Rob Gould at rgould@stat.ucla.edu.
Undergraduates can register for DataFest at http://datafest.stat.ucla.edu. All others can look to the same link to learn more about this and past DataFests.
2013 UCLA DataFest is Listed as an Official "International Year of Statistics" Event!
Please see link: http://www.statistics2013.org/statistics2013-global-supporters/activities/
Jake Porway (Ph.D. 2010) Interviewed in UCLA Magazine
The January 2013 issue of UCLA Magazine features an interview with Jake Porway (Ph.D 2010), founder and executive director of non-profit DataKind. In the interview Jake discusses data science and his non-profit which connects scientists and non-profit organizations. The interview is available at: http://magazine.ucla.edu/depts/style/data-do-gooder/.
Professor Rob Gould Interviewed on Google's "Policy by the Numbers"
Rob was interviewed with Chris Franklin (University of Georgia). The interview concerned Statistics Education and is available at: http://policybythenumbers.blogspot.com/2012/11/data-hangout-on-air-4-statistical.html
Kerchau Li: Elected to Academicians of Academia Sinica
Congratulations to Professor Kerchau Li, who was elected to Academicians of Academia Sinica (AS) during the July convocation of AS in Taipei, Taiwan. This prestigious honor recognizes scholars of Chinese origin. Also elected in July to Academicians of AS is Jianqing Fan (formerly a professor of Statistics at UCLA). They have joined the ranks of other eminent statisticians like Wing H. Wong (also formerly a professor of Statistics at UCLA).
2013 Spring Research Conference (SRC2013) on Statistics in Industry and Technology
The 2013 Spring Research Conference (SRC2013) on Statistics in Industry and Technology will be held on UCLA campus from June 20 to 22, 2013. Full details are available at: http://www.stat.ucla.edu/src2013/
Elizabeth Frank (2012) , Statistics Major, Gets Byline in Front-page L.A. Times Article
You can read the investigative article about the re-selling of used cars at the L.A. Times website:
http://soc.li/g00Pm8d
Katharine Mullen: Adjunct Assistant Professor
Katharine Mullen has joined the department as Adjunct Assistant Professor.
Katharine comes to us from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Maryland where, since 2008, she has been a postdoc in the Ceramics Division and staff researcher in the Statistical Engineering Division. She completed her Ph.D. at the VU University, Amsterdam in 2008. Her research has been in the areas of computational physics, chemometrics, computational statistics, and optimization. Katharine's interests include open- source software projects, especially the R project for statistical computing.
Qing Zhou Promoted to Associate Professor
Qing Zhou has been promoted Associate Professor II, with tenure.
About Qing Zhou's Research
Qing's areas of research are computational biology and Monte Carlo methods.
In computational biology his research group's goal is to develop statistical methodology for efficient analysis of large-scale high-throughput genomic data employing likelihood-based methods, such as Bayesian modeling and regularization, to make statistical inference on these data. His group is interested in a detailed understanding of gene regulation and aim to decode regulatory circuits by integrating gene expression data, RNA-Seq data, ChIP-Seq data, and DNA sequence data.
Qing also is involved in developing Monte Carlo methods to characterize statistical and topological structures of probability distributions, with applications in Bayesian inference and statistical physics. He is interested in exploring energy landscapes by Monte Carlo algorithms with the use of energy-temperature design, density of states, the tree of sublevel sets, and basins of attraction.
Qing started with the department on July 1, 2006.
Congratulations Qing on your promotion. Well-deserved.
Nicolas Christou: Recipient of ASA Initiative Award
Congratulations to Nicolas Christou who received a members initiative award from the American Statistical Association and $7000. The goal of his proposal entitled, Integrating Spatial Statistics into the Undergraduate Curriculum, is to raise awareness in the statistics community of the benefits of the inclusion of spatial data in introductory statistics courses.
Congratulations Nicolas.
Andrew Bray: Collegium of University Teaching Fellowship Recipient
Andrew Bray has been awarded the Collegium of University Teaching Fellowship to teach the seminar entitled "Reasoning with Uncertainty" in the 2012-2013 term.
About the Course
This course will explore the ways in which we use scientic reasoning to navigate the path from data to decisions. We will draw upon ideas in probability, logic, psychology, and economics to establish the methods that constitute the gold standard for reasoning through science. We will also discuss the ways in which our reasoning can lead us astray by learning about the many biases and fallacies to which we are subject. These concepts will be fleshed out by studying three areas of current or past controversy: smoking and health, evolution and intelligent design, and climate change.
About the CUTF
The Collegium of University Teaching Fellows (CUTF) is an innovative program that creates unique learning opportunities for both graduate teaching fellows and undergraduate students on campus. Through the program, some of UCLA's very best advanced graduate students have the opportunity to develop and teach a lower division seminar in their field of specialization on a one-time only basis. This experience serves as a "capstone" to the teaching apprenticeship, preparing them for the academic job market and their role as future faculty. At the same time, undergraduates enrolled in CUTF seminars have the chance to take courses that are at the cutting edge of a discipline, and to experience the benefits of participating in a small-seminar environment.
Amy Braverman: 2012 American Statistical Association Fellow
The American Statistical Association Committee on Fellows has selected Amy Braverman as 2012 Fellow for contributions to environmental statistics, particularly in the interface between massive-data reduction and remote sensing; and for service to the statistics community in climate research and policy.
Fellows will be presented with their awards on Tuesday, July 31, 2012, at 8:00 p.m. in San Diego, California at the San Diego Convention Center during the Joint Statistical Meetings awards ceremony.
We congratulate Amy on her achievement.
Robert Gould: 2012 American Statistical Association Fellow
The American Statistical Association Committee on Fellows has selected Rob Gould as 2012 Fellow for innovative, wide-reaching, and far-reaching contributions to statistics education at the high school, community college, and undergraduate levels; for excellence in teaching statistics; and for outstanding service to the ASA.
Fellows will be presented with their awards on Tuesday, July 31, 2012, at 8:00 p.m. in San Diego, California at the San Diego Convention Center during the Joint Statistical Meetings awards ceremony.
We congratulate Rob on his achievement.
Coding for a Cause
Congratulations to Maria Pavlovskaia and the rest of her team for winning UCLA's fifth annual Coding for a Cause Competition in January.
In this competition teams of up to five people pick a project to improve the lives of the disabled.
Maria's team chose to create an online Sudoku application for blind and visually impaired people.
Sudoku is a numerical puzzle whose objective is to fill a partially completed 9x9 grid with digits so that each column, each row, and each of the nine 3x3 sub-grids that compose the grid contain all of the digits from 1 to 9.
The application they created had the ability to: read out sections of the grid and answer common questions about the status of the grid. It had a large easy-to-read uncluttered display for the visually impaired and text output with screen reader capability for the blind.
This two-day event was sponsored by Project: Possibility, a nonprofit organization dedicated to creating open source software for persons with disabilities.
The four other members of Maria's team were: Kyle Morton, Roger Call, Inchara Shivalingaiah and Damon Alexander.
The team went on in March to compete at the 27th Annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference at CSUN. They placed third.
Project Cascade Among Fast Company's 22 Best Infographics for 2011
Infographics can help struggling news organizations exploit the nuances of social media to reach more readers. Here, data-viz wiz Jer Thorp, UCLA prof Mark Hansen, and staff data scientist Jake Porway developed a way for the New York Times to visualize how stories spread across Twitter--info the paper can then use to program tweets that grow their audience (and, hopefully, their ad dollars).
From The 23 Best Infographics We Found in 2011, by Suzanne LaBarre
Find out more about the Cascade project at
Infographic Of The Day: 3-D Model Unlocks Secrets Of Twitterverse
Teaching Computers To See
Statistics professor Song-Chu Zhu studies artificial intelligence to help computers understand one of the most challenging skills of all.
Read more about Song-Chun's work in this UCLA College Report...
http://bruinlink.ucla.edu/teaching-computers-to-see.pdf
Jan de Leeuw on "History and Theory of Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis"
A talk was given by Jan de Leeuw, Feb 11 on the occasion of the CARME 2011 organized by the Applied Mathematic Department Agrocampus Ouest.
Title: History and Theory of Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis
Abstract: Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA) is discussed as a form of Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis (NLPCA). It is compared with other forms of NLPCA that have been proposed over the years: Shepard-Kruskal-Breiman-Friedman-Gi PCA with optimal scaling, aspect analysis of correlations, Guttman's MSA, Logit/Probit PCA of binary data, and Logistic Homogeneity Analysis.
Watch the presentation on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-hFORcBj44
Journal of Statistical Software Ranked Among "Rising Stars" Among Journals Two Years in a Row
Thomson-Reuters, who also have the Journal of Statistical Software listed in computer science, have (for the second time) crowned the JSS a "Rising Star", which means it is the fastest growing journal in computer science (in terms of their impact statistics). It would be nice if the journal could be listed in Statistics, but both Elsevier and Thomson are not really aware of the fact that Statistics exists (except as a branch of Mathematics).
List of "Rising Stars" for 2011
Journal of Statistical Software
