Chief Scientist receives honour from Royal Statistical Society

Wednesday 29 Mar 2023

Headshot of Mark GirolamiProfessor Mark Girolami, Chief Scientist at The Alan Turing Institute has been awarded the Guy Medal in Silver by the Royal Statistical Society today (Wednesday 29 March). 

Professor Girolami has been awarded the medal for his contributions to computational statistics and machine learning - in particular, his work on differential geometric approaches to stochastic simulation for statistical inference, published in the paper “Riemann manifold Langevin and Hamiltonian Monte Carlo methods” (with co-author Calderhead), which was read to the Society in 2011.

Every year the Royal Statistical Society celebrates outstanding contributions to the development of statistics through their honours. This year, the winners will be presented with their awards at a ceremony during their annual conference in Harrogate in September. 

Dr Andrew Garrett, RSS President and Chair of the Honours Committee, said: ‘On behalf of the Royal Statistical Society, I offer my congratulations to this year’s recipients. Their work has not only strengthened the discipline but led to greater understanding of many important issues.’

Professor Girolami was appointed Chief Scientist at the Alan Turing Institute following his successful leadership of the Data Centric Engineering Programme. He said: “I am truly honoured to receive the Guy Medal in Silver from the Royal Statistical Society. It is an even greater honour to be placed in such distinguished ranks as those of the past honourees, all of whom have made important and innovative contributions to the theory and application of Statistical Science.”

The citations in full for each of this year’s recipients can be seen on the Royal Statistical Society’s dedicated honours page

The Guy Medal in Silver is awarded alongside the Guy Medal in Bronze, the David Cox Research Price, The Barnett Award and the Honorary Fellowship.

The Guy medals are named after the British medical statistician, William Augustus Guy. The Bronze and Silver medals are awarded annually, with a Gold Medal awarded every two years. The Research Prize is awarded to those near the beginning of their research career for an outstanding published contribution to statistical theory or application. In 2021 the Prize was renamed in honour of former RSS president Professor Sir David Cox. The Barnett Award is awarded for contributions to environmental statistics, established in memory of Vic Barnett. The Honorary Fellowship is awarded to significant individuals working in fields related to statistics who are not necessarily or primarily members of the statistical profession.