Henry Wynn

Wynn gained a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics from Oxford{{citation needed |date=January 2022}} and a PhD in Mathematical Statistics from Imperial College, London.{{Mathgenealogy|id=147504}} He was appointed a Lecturer and then Reader at Imperial College before moving to City University London in 1985 as Professor of Mathematical Statistics (and Dean of Mathematics from 1987 to 1995). At City he co-founded the Engineering Design Centre.

He moved again, in 1995, to the University of Warwick as founding Director of the Risk Initiative and Statistical Consultancy Unit. He is currently, from 2003, Professor of Statistics at the Department of Statistics, London School of Economics where he leads the Decision Support and Risk Group.{{cite web|url=http://www2.lse.ac.uk/CATS/WhosWho/HenryPage.aspx |title=Henry P. Wynn |publisher=London School of Economics |access-date=22 January 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101010093927/http://www2.lse.ac.uk/CATS/WhosWho/HenryPage.aspx |archive-date=10 October 2010 }}

Wynn was a founding president of the European Network for Business and Industrial Statistics (ENBIS) and a Co-Investigator on the Research Councils UK funded project Managing Uncertainty in Complex Models (MUCM). He authored around 140 published papers and three books/monographs.

He was awarded the Guy Medal in Silver from the Royal Statistical Society and the George Box Medal from the European Network for Business and Industrial Statistics (ENBIS),{{cite web| url=http://www.enbis.org/awards/george_box_medal/index?_ts=459743| title=George Box Medal}}{{cite web| url=http://www2.lse.ac.uk/statistics/news/news.aspx| title=LSE statistics department news| access-date=7 April 2011| archive-date=3 March 2011| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110303060410/http://www2.lse.ac.uk/statistics/news/news.aspx| url-status=dead}} was an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries and a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics.

Wynn was the elected President of the Royal Statistical Society in 1977,{{cite web|url=http://www.rss.org.uk/site/cms/contentviewarticle.asp?article=486 |title=Royal Statistical Society - Presidents |publisher=Royal Statistical Society |access-date=22 January 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120317044817/http://www.rss.org.uk/site/cms/contentviewarticle.asp?article=486 |archive-date=17 March 2012 }} the first president to be elected by a contested vote. From 1834 to 1978, RSS Presidents had always been nominated and returned unopposed. In 1978 however there had been a lot of opposition when Council arranged for Sir Campbell Adamson to stand for Council, on the understanding that he would stand for and become president the following year. However, for the first time in living memory there was an election for Council, and Campbell Adamson came last out of a 25 candidates. (There were 25 candidates and 24 place on Council.) Despite this, Campbell Adamson was put up for president, and Wynn was nominated as an alternative candidate. Although Wynn was relatively unknown at the time, he won the election and completed his presidency.

He undertook a wide range of research in theoretical and applied statistics, focusing principally on model building. Projects with a biological focus include work in dynamic modelling in biology (multi-strain models).

Wynn died from cancer on 2 November 2024, at the age of 79.{{cite news |last1=Wynn |first1=Hamish |title=Henry Wynn obituary |url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/feb/02/henry-wynn-obituary |access-date=2 February 2025 |publisher=The Guardian |date=2 February 2025}}

Monographs from 2000

• "Dynamical Search" (H.P.Wynn, L Pronzato and A Zhigljavsky), Chapman & Hall/CRC, 2000
• "Algebraic Statistics" (H.P.Wynn, E Riccomagno and G Pistone), Chapman and Hall/CRC, 2001.
• {{cite book |last1=Wynn |first1=Henry P |title=Against Sacrifice: An essay on risk and ethics |date=2021 |publisher=Matador |isbn=978-1800463363 }}

Selected papers

• "The Sequential Generation of D-Optimum Experimental Designs" (Henry P. Wynn), The Annals of Mathematical Statistics (1970) [https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/2239871.pdf jstor]
• "Design and Analysis of Computer Experiments" (Jerome Sacks, William J. Welch, Toby J. Mitchell and Henry P. Wynn). Statistical Science (1989). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/2245865.pdf jstor]

{{reflist}}

• [https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?hl=en&user=j68xMRkAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&pagesize=100 Google scholar page]
• [http://www.lse.ac.uk/CATS/Whos%20Who/Henry%20Wynn%20Home%20Page.aspx Personal home page]

{{Guy Medal}}

{{Royal Statistical Society presidents}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wynn, Henry}}

Category:1945 births

Category:2024 deaths

Category:Academics of City, University of London

Category:Academics of Imperial College London

Category:Academics of the London School of Economics

Category:Academics of the University of Warwick

Category:Alumni of Imperial College London

Category:British statisticians

Category:Fellows of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics

Category:Presidents of the Royal Statistical Society