Michael Pencina, PhD

Michael Pencina, PhD
Vice Dean for Data Science

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As vice dean of data scienceDr. Pencina is responsible for developing and implementing quantitative science strategies as they pertain to the education and training, and laboratory, clinical science, and data science missions of the School of Medicine. He leads the School’s IT strategic direction and investments, working in collaboration with the vice presidents and chief information officers of Duke Health and Duke University’s Office of Information Technology.

Dr. Pencina is a professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at Duke University and served as director of Biostatistics at the Duke Clinical Research Institute (DRCI). He is an internationally recognized expert in risk prediction model development and evaluation. Expert panels and guideline groups frequently recommend methods for quantifying improvement in model performance proposed in his research.

Dr. Pencina is actively involved in the design, conduct and analysis of clinical studies with particular focus on novel and efficient designs and applications of machine learning for medical decision support. He interacts regularly with investigators from academic and industry institutions as well as with the Food and Drug Administration.

Thomson Reuters/Clarivate Analytics recognized Dr. Pencina as a Highly Cited Researcher in social sciences and clinical medicine for the years 2014 – 2020. He is co-author of over 370 manuscripts published in peer-reviewed journals and has been cited nearly 65,000 times in professional publications. He serves as Deputy Editor for Statistics at JAMA-Cardiology and Associate Editor for Statistics in Medicine.

In 2003, Dr. Pencina received his PhD in Mathematics and Statistics from Boston University. He holds master’s degrees from the University of Warsaw in actuarial mathematics and business culture.  Dr. Pencina joined the Duke University faculty in 2013.  He served as an associate professor in the Department of Biostatistics at Boston University and the Framingham Heart Study and as director of Statistical Consulting at the Harvard Clinical Research Institute.