Philip Ernst, who begins his first semester as professor of statistics with Culverhouse and is an Endowed Shelby Distinguished Professor, was recently honored as a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS), one of the premier global societies in probability and statistics. The designation recognizes individuals with a distinguished record of research, and it is one of the most prestigious career milestones in the field.
For Ernst, the recognition carries personal significance. As a doctoral student at the Wharton School, his thesis advisor, the late Larry Shepp, encouraged him to pursue the IMS fellowship as a career goal. “He told me, ‘If you work hard enough, one day you’ll be an IMS fellow,’” Ernst said. “It became the benchmark I set for myself. To receive it after just over a decade in the field is incredibly meaningful.”
The path to this distinction included earlier recognition, such as the 2018 Tweedie New Researcher Award from IMS, presented annually to a single early career researcher for groundbreaking contributions in probability or statistics. Ernst’s research spans applied probability, mathematical finance, stochastic control, and statistical theory, including advances on long-standing open problems such as “nonsense correlation.”
Though the fellowship comes with little more than a plaque and a title, Ernst sees it as an affirmation of years of sustained, high-level scholarship. “Almost every IMS Fellow is someone who has truly shaped the field,” he says. “To be counted among them tells me that the work I’ve devoted my career to has made an impact—and that’s something I’m very proud of.”