About Dr Anurika De Silva

Anurika is an early career biostatistician working towards the advancement of Public Health at the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) research Hub, University of Melbourne. Having obtained a BSc in Industrial Statistics from the University of Colombo (Sri Lanka) and a PhD in Biostatistics from the University of Melbourne, Anurika now enjoys using maths and stats to help doctors find best treatments for patients. She currently leads a research program focused on developing novel and robust statistical methods for clinical research.

Anurika has fostered and led strong clinical and statistical collaborations in multidisciplinary teams from national and international institutes and she frequently delivers seminars and workshops on statistical methods to health practitioners. Enthusiastic about teaching and much loved by her students, Anurika supervises PhD and Master students and is also the coordinator for the Master of Public Health subject on Biostatistics at the University of Melbourne with >300 students.

Having loved maths since a young age, Anurika is one of Science & Technology Australia’s Superstars of STEM, is passionate about encouraging the next generation into STEM study and careers and advocating for gender diversity in STEM.

About the Superstars of STEM program

Superstars of STEM is a game-changing Australian initiative to smash gender assumptions about who can work in science, technology, engineering and maths. Since it was created by Science & Technology Australia in 2017, it has made a powerful contribution to start to tackle the serious gender inequity of visible diverse role models featured in the media as experts in STEM.  Open to women and non-binary people, the program equips brilliant diverse STEM experts with advanced communication skills and opportunities – in the media, on stage and in schools. The result: we’re growing a critical mass of more diverse celebrity scientists appearing regularly in the Australian media to inspire our next generations of young Australians into STEM study and careers.