I am interested in biological problems that require both computational and statistical methods. I started out doing tropical ecology. Then I was a software tester for a while, where I learned programming. I took a bunch of statistics classes at night (two of my favorites were Bayesian Statistics and Stochastic Simulation). I am a fan of open source collaboration and plan on using software engineering techniques like automated testing, version control and continuous integration in my future research. Here are some things I want to learn more about:
- Bayesian hierarchical modeling and probabilistic graphical models
- Bayesian nonparametrics, including all the stochastic processes theory beneath it (Dirichlet processes, etc)
- Nonparametric and semiparametric statistics in general
- Variational Inference- I find this an intriguing alternative to MCMC
- Spatial Statistics (I love looking at maps)
- How does the choice of projection affect things? Is there a way to do 3-D spatial stats measuring distance in great circles, etc.?
- Causal Inference- I don't know much about it currently but it seems interesting.
- Missing Data- I am somewhat familiar with the EM algorithm and the Bayesian approach of using "latent parameters" but I'd like to learn more about the state-of-the-art, and especially how to address computational issues that arise.
- building bioinformatics "pipelines"
- High-dimensional data techniques
- Machine Learning- I took a Coursera class on this and want to get a deeper, more theoretical understanding. I'd like to also trying some of the tools like elastic net, SVMs, etc. on different kinds of large datasets.
- Graph data (eg, social networks), computing and stats on large, non-relational databases
- The Julia programming language- I am fond of Python, but this new language is very exciting
- Metagenomics- this seems like an exciting place for testing ecological hypotheses that could have relevance to health outcomes. For example, ecologists often debate whether diversity of a system affects its stability. I wonder if higher microbiome diversity is associated with stability? Or, in another example, is someone who eats a wide variety of types of food (such as an international traveler) more likely to have a diverse gut flora than someone who doesn't travel?
- Epigenetics- how can we measure epigenetic modifications?
- Mental Health
- Cancer