Industrial Statistics Webinar: Janet van Niekirk

Speaker:       Janet van Niekerk, The University of Pretoria, South Africa
Title:              INLA for Biostatistics
Time:            Thursday, March 19, 2026, 11:00 am -12:00 noon (US EST)

Zoom Link:  https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89750941157?pwd=EasXS7lmjUTbGTLjaXEyctnWN89srE.1

Meeting ID: 897 5094 1157
Passcode: 946170

Abstract
INLA has been established as an accurate approximate method in Bayesian inference. A modern formulation of INLA combining the Laplace method with Variational Bayes, was proposed and implemented in 2021. This new formulation enables various applications that were previously infeasible. In this talk I will give the intuition behind the modern INLA framework, and present various case studies within the field of Biostatistics where INLA has been recently applied.