Statistics and Data Science – NASA
A primary goal of biomedical research at NASA is to acquire data to assess, understand, and evaluate the biomedical hazards of spaceflight and to develop effective countermeasures. Data Science (S&DS) staff provide statistical support to NASA JSC Human Health and Performance Directorate groups and other NASA communities. They have expertise in developing complex study designs, applying modern statistical methods, and analyzing data collected within NASA operational constraints (small sample sizes, limited astronaut population).
Beyond statistics, the group contributes to data engineering and mining. Data engineering involves the extraction and transformation of data for analysis and visualization. Data can come in many different formats, the S&DS team helps researchers harmonize (bring together data sets) information across sources. Exploration includes initial analysis and creation of informative visualizations to deepen understanding of the evidence. Analysis and interpretation of data to produce insights follows.
The S&DS team provides collaborative and advisory expertise to Management in the application of statistical theory and practice to ongoing biomedical research. Staff assist in the preparation of sections of research proposals that address experiment design, statistical modeling, and subsequent analysis of anticipated research data. Once data is collected, S&DS statisticians help analyze, visualize, and interpret the results so investigators can extract the most information while maintaining statistical integrity. An S&DS statistician may be a co-investigator on a project requiring sophisticated modeling and/or statistical analysis techniques. Through collaboration, S&DS team members expand their knowledge base in medical fields as diverse as environmental physiology, osteopathy, neurology, pharmacology, microbiology, cardiology, nutrition and psychology. To address the unique data collected by NASA, statisticians can develop new techniques to address challenges such as small sample sizes of ISS studies, missing data, operational constraints, and new outcome measures.
S&DS team contributors often reside within the Directorate, but statistics and data science support is extended to other Johnson Space Center organizations, including the Directorate of Engineering, Human Resources, and the Office of Education. The S&DS team also provides a venue where high school, undergraduate, and graduate interns can participate in the analysis and interpretation of NASA biomedical data. Students assigned to the S&DS team have a rare opportunity to gain real-world research experience in various biomedical fields.
Millennia Young, Ph.D.
