Ronald D. Fricker Jr is a Professor and Head of the Virginia Tech Department of Statistics. He holds a PhD and an MA in Statistics from Yale University, an MS in Operations Research from The George Washington University and a bachelor’s degree from the United States Naval Academy. A Fellow of the American Statistical Association and Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute, Dr Fricker is the author of Introduction to Statistical Methods for Biosurveillance (CUP, 2013) and more than 80 other publications.