Why Study Biostatistics at the University of Minnesota

One of our goals is to train students in the kind of work that we do. To meet this goal, we have:

• small classes and individual faculty attention,
• state-of-the-art computing facilities,
• proximity to a large Academic Health Center,
• a strong record in job placement,
• teaching and research assistantships, and
• opportunities for work experience in clinical trials.

Additionally, the Division maintains a strong research program. Biostatistics faculty and students actively contribute to applied research in projects such as

• community-based clinical trials in HIV/AIDS,
• prevention of lung disease in smokers,
• pathogenesis and treatment of otitis media (ear infection) in children,
• prevention and treatment of colon cancer,
• spatial clustering of disease, and
• effects of risk factor intervention on death rate from coronary heart disease.

Biostatistics faculty also do extensive work in developing new methods for data analysis. The most active areas of research in our division at present include Bayesian methods, high-speed computing and simulation, survival analysis, analysis of geographical patterns of disease, longitudinal data analysis, and methods for analyzing data from epidemologic studies and clinical trials.