We are extremely pleased to announce that alumna Andrea S. Foulkes, ScD ’00 will be the recipient of the 2022 Lagakos Distinguished Alumni Award!
Dr. Foulkes has distinguished herself as a preeminent leader in the advancement of statistical science. Over the course of her career she has had a major impact on the field, both as an internationally recognized researcher and scholar and as a talented and dedicated teacher and mentor.
Dr. Foulkes’ is an established investigator with an extensive track record in biostatistical methods research aimed at addressing emerging data challenges and critical questions in translational medicine. Her research includes methods for high-dimensional molecular and cellular data and measures of disease progression with applications in inflammatory disease, cardio-metabolic disease and HIV/AIDS. She has been the recipient on an R-01 on methods for high-dimensional data in HIV/CVD research andhas published over 18 papers in the field of HIV research. She currently has an ongoing R-01 grant from the NIH on methods for integrated analysis of multi-level omics data.
After being recruited to be the Director of the Biostatistics Center at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Dr. Foulkes has quickly emerged as one of the most impactful leaders within the MGH Research Institute. She recently obtained a $40M grant from the NIH to study Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 Infection. While at MGH, she has been praised for her vision, her knowledge, her leadership skills, and her ability to continue the long tradition of leading impactful trans-disciplinary collaborations with clinical investigators, while expanding in strategic areas of “big data” science including precision medicine applications.
In addition to her methods research in biostatistics, one of Dr. Foulkes’ most impactful contributions is her acclaimed graduate-level textbook “Applied Statistical Genetics with R” in 2009 for Springer’s UseR! Series, which has over 30,000 chapter downloads. Dr. Foulkes was lead senior author on a Statistics in Medicine tutorial entitled “A guide to genome-wide association analysis and post-analytic interrogation”, which is consistently one of the most accessed Statistics in Medicine manuscripts. She has also led the development of open-source, freely available instructional and computational resources. The companion website for Open Resources in Statistical Genomics aims to further facilitate statistical learning in the free, open-source R computing environment through easily accessible tutorials, well documented code, and descriptions of methods and bioinformatics resources that are commonly used in practice. Andrea’s leadership in the realm of open-access educational materials in statistical genomics, has undoubtedly had a substantial impact on best statistical practice, particularly on the application of sound statistical principles, in this rapidly emerging field over the past decade.
In addition to her commitment to education, Dr. Foulkes has played a pivotal role as a mentor- guiding over 20 MS and PhD level graduate students and serving as primary mentor to four post-doctoral research fellows in Biostatistic. She has been equally engaged with undergraduate students, particular mentoring underrepresented groups in STEM, and supporting women in launching careers in the statistical sciences.
Dr. Foulkes is a wonderful representative of this award which honors the legacy of Dr. Stephen Lagakos and is a true reflection of the vital spirit Steve brought to the field. Quoted by one of her nominators, there is “no better person to embody Professor Lagakos’ qualities of commitment, passion, intellectual brilliance, and personal generosity.”
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Dr. Foulkes joined the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health after receiving her BA in Mathematics from Brown University. After receiving her doctorate in 2000 under the direction of Dr. Victor DeGruttola, Dr. Foulkes stayed as a postdoctoral research fellow to continue her work in HIV genetics. She served on the faculty and as Department Chair in the Five Colleges of Western Massachusetts for 15 years prior to returning to Harvard/MGH in 2019. She is currently Director of Biostatistics at Massachusetts General Hospital, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.Dr. Foulkes is scheduled to give an in-person lecture (also available via Zoom) at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health on:Thursday, October 13, 2022.More details to follow.
