"Richard’s contribution to methodological and theoretical statistics has been truly outstanding, as have his contributions to the statistical profession"

A St John’s academic has been awarded the Royal Statistical Society’s prestigious Guy Medal in Silver the day after winning an international prize.

Professor Richard Samworth, University Professor of Statistical Science and Director of the Statistical Laboratory at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences, has been praised for his exceptional contributions to the field of statistics.

The St John’s Fellow, who is College Lecturer in Pure Mathematics, was also recognised for being a role model in the statistical profession.

He said: “I was delighted to learn that I have been awarded the Royal Statistical Society Guy Medal in Silver for 2025. The list of previous recipients is long and distinguished, and it’s an honour to join them.”

The announcement comes less than 24 hours after the news Professor Samworth has been awarded the David Cox Medal for Statistics, which commemorates the work of the late pioneering ‘giant’ of statistics and St John’s alumnus.

Sir David Cox, who died in 2022, studied Mathematics at the College in the 1940s and was later a Royal Statistical Society President and an Honorary Fellow of St John’s. In 1973 he won the society’s lifetime achievement award, the Gold Guy Medal.

The society gives awards to statisticians and data professionals that have made exceptional contributions to the field, through cutting-edge research, tireless service to the community, making practical advances and innovations and communicating and educating the public about statistics.

Guy Medals are named after the distinguished British medical statistician, William Augustus Guy, and date back to 1892. The silver medal is awarded annually to society Fellows who have communicated papers of special merit to the community or published them in its journals, along with other contributions to statistics.

Professor Samworth’s research involves the development of methodology and theory for shape-constrained inference, random ensemble classification, data-perturbation techniques, and changepoint estimation. His citation from the society states that his discussion paper, Maximum likelihood estimation of a multi-dimensional log-concave density, ‘became a landmark’.

“Richard’s contribution to methodological and theoretical statistics has been truly outstanding, as have his contributions to the statistical profession as a whole,” added Professor Sir John Aston, current President of the Royal Statistical Society.

“He is a real supporter of others in the community, having worked tirelessly in mentoring students and researchers. Richard is to be congratulated for his achievements as a role model in the field.”

The medal will be presented along with other honours at the society’s annual conference in Edinburgh this September. Sir John added: “Our 2025 honours recipients exemplify the wide-ranging positive impact statistics can have on improving research outcomes and on society.

“On behalf of the RSS, I am delighted to give my heartfelt congratulations to all this year’s recipients.”

Published 3/04/2025

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