The San Antonio Chapter of the American Statistical Association presented the 2025 Don Owen Award to Marina Vannucci, Noah Harding Professor of Statistics in the George R. Brown School of Engineering and Computing at Rice University.
This award is bestowed upon a statistician who embodies the three-fold accomplishments of Dr. Donald B. Owen, who before his death in 1991 was a Distinguished Professor of Statistics at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. Dr. Owen's illustrious career serves as the standard against which nominees are evaluated for excellence in research, editorial activities, and service to the statistical community
“I am honored to receive the 2025 Don Owen Award, and to join such a distinguished group of past recipients, which also includes my colleague, David Scott, a Rice Emeritus Professor,” Vannucci said. “It is particularly gratifying to be recognized by the statistical community for my activities and contributions to the various areas of our profession.”
Vannucci is among the world’s most highly accomplished and prominent Bayesian statisticians. Her research expertise is centered around theoretical, methodological and computational advancements in Bayesian statistical modeling and inference with substantive scientific applications. She has made several innovative contributions to the development and application of Bayesian methods in the areas of graphical models and complex dependencies; model choice and variable selection; nonparametric Bayesian methods; dynamic and state-space models; wavelets and functional data analysis; and Bayesian computing for machine learning. Her research contributions are an appealing blend of fundamental theoretical and methodological innovation with substantive scientific applications - with several multidisciplinary collaborations she has helped solve statistical problems in bioinformatics, neuroscience, neurology, neuroimaging, and engineering.
Vannucci holds a significant record of editorial contributions and leadership. During 2020-2023, she served as Co-Editor of the Journal of the American Statistical Association, widely recognized as the flagship journal of our profession. In the past she served with distinction as Editor-in-Chief of Bayesian Analysis, which is the flagship journal of the ISBA and of Stat, which is a journal endorsed by the International Statistical Institute. Recently, she led the activities of the Founding Editors board of the Journal Statistics and Data Science in Imaging, supported by the American Statistical Association (ASA) and its Statistics in Imaging (SI) Section. The Journal was launched in late 2024 and Vannucci is serving as the first Editor-in-Chief for 2024-2026.
Vannucci is widely recognized for her exemplary service and leadership to the statistics research community. She completed with distinction her 5-year term as chair of the Department of Statistics at Rice University from 2014 until 2019. In another influential leadership role, she served as the president of ISBA in 2018. In 2020, she was awarded the Zellner Medal by ISBA, for exceptional service over an extended period with long-lasting impact. She has also served on many notable scientific advisory boards, review panels and committees for grants, and has also built a very strong record in international service dedicated to the global growth of statistical science.
An important aspect of Vannucci’s career, and what makes her a true role model to other statisticians, is her superlative record as an advisor and mentor. She has, to date, supervised 28 doctoral students, mentored 12 post-doctoral research scholars, and 5 visiting fellows and students. Most of her mentees are now employed in prestigious universities or high-profile research institutions, and several are in private sector entities at the top echelon of data technologies.
She is an elected Member of the International Statistical Institute (ISI) and the Royal Statistical Society (RSS) and an elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA), the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA).