Jean Yee Hwa Yang is an Australian statistician known for her work on

variance reduction In mathematics, more specifically in the theory of Monte Carlo methods, variance reduction is a procedure used to increase the precision of the estimates obtained for a given simulation or computational effort. Every output random variable fr ...

for

microarray A microarray is a multiplex (assay), multiplex lab-on-a-chip. Its purpose is to simultaneously detect the expression of thousands of biological interactions. It is a two-dimensional array on a Substrate (materials science), solid substrate—usu ...

s, and for inferring proteins from

mass spectrometry Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a ''mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is used ...

data. Yang is a Professor in the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD) is a public university, public research university in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in both Australia and Oceania. One of Australia's six sandstone universities, it was one of the ...

Education and career

Yang earned a bachelor's degree with first class honours and a University Medal from the

in 1996, in mathematics and statistics. After working for half a year at the

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency that is responsible for scientific research and its commercial and industrial applications. CSIRO works with leading organisations arou ...

, Yang then went to the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

, for graduate study, completing her Ph.D. in statistics in 2002. Her dissertation, "Statistical methods in the design and analysis of gene expression data from cDNA microarray experiment", was supervised by Terry Speed. Yang did postdoctoral research in

biostatistics Biostatistics (also known as biometry) is a branch of statistics that applies statistical methods to a wide range of topics in biology. It encompasses the design of biological experiments, the collection and analysis of data from those experimen ...

and

bioinformatics Bioinformatics () is an interdisciplinary field of science that develops methods and Bioinformatics software, software tools for understanding biological data, especially when the data sets are large and complex. Bioinformatics uses biology, ...

with Mark R. Segal at the

University of California, San Francisco The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Francisco, California, United States. It is part of the University of California system and is dedic ...

, where she became an assistant professor in 2003. In 2005, she returned to the University of Sydney with a faculty position.

Recognition

In 2015, Yang was the winner of the Moran Medal of the

Australian Academy of Science The Australian Academy of Science was founded in 1954 by a group of distinguished Australians, including Australian Fellows of the Royal Society of London. The first president was Sir Mark Oliphant. The academy is modelled after the Royal Soci ...

for her "significant contributions to the development of statistical methodology for analyzing molecular data arising in contemporary biomedical research". She was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of New South Wales The Royal Society of New South Wales is a learned society based in Sydney, Australia. The Governor of New South Wales is the vice-regal patron of the Society. It is the oldest learned society in the Southern Hemisphere. The Society traces its ...

in 2025.

Selected publications

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References

External links

Home page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yang, Jean Yee Hwa Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Australian statisticians Australian women statisticians Fellows of the Royal Society of New South Wales University of Sydney alumni Academic staff of the University of Sydney University of California, San Francisco faculty Scientists from Sydney