Meet the 102-Year-Old Statistician Who Won the Equivalent of the Nobel Prize!

Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao, a renowned Indian-American mathematician and statistician, has been awarded the 2023 International Prize in Statistics, which is regarded as the Nobel Prize equivalent in the field of statistics. This award recognizes Rao's remarkable contributions to statistics and its application in various areas, including medical research. The 102-year-old scholar will receive a reward of $80,000 in July at the biennial World Statistics Congress of the International Statistical Institute in Ottawa, Canada. Rao's groundbreaking work has had a significant impact on statistical thinking, and his findings continue to influence science across many disciplines. In his seminal 1945 paper published in the Bulletin of the Calcutta Mathematical Society, Rao demonstrated three critical results that laid the foundation for modern statistics. The Cramer-Rao lower bound, the Rao-Blackwell theorem, and information geometry collectively serve as the cornerstone around which much of statistics is constructed. These findings enable scientists to mine data more effectively for insights. Rao's academic achievements are impressive, including a Doctorate from King's College at Cambridge University and a DSc degree from Cambridge. He has held significant positions, including director of the Indian Statistical Institute, Jawaharlal Nehru Professor and National Professor in India, University Professor at the University of Pittsburgh, and Eberly Professor and Chair of Statistics and Director of the Center for Multivariate Analysis at Pennsylvania State University. He is currently a research professor at the University at Buffalo and a professor emeritus at Pennsylvania State University. In recognition of his work, Rao has received numerous awards, including the Padma Bhushan in 1968 and Padma Vibhushan in 2001, both conferred by the Indian government. The International Prize in Statistics Foundation has now honored him for his monumental contribution to the field of statistics.