Biography, Disciplines and Teaching Interests

Dr. Karl Peace is senior research scientist and professor of biostatistics in the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health (JPHCOPH) at Georgia Southern University and Adjunct Professor of Biostatistics at the VCU School of Medicine. He holds a Ph.D. in biostatistics from the Medical College of Virginia, a M.S. in mathematics from Clemson University, a B.S. in chemistry from Georgia Southern College and a Health Science Certificate from Vanderbilt University. 

Peace's first career was that of teaching and research at the university level at Georgia Southern, Clemson University, Virginia Commonwealth University and Randolph-Macon College. He holds or has held adjunct appointments at the Medical College of Virginia, the University of Michigan, Temple University, the University of North Carolina and Duke University.

His second career was in research, technical support and management in the pharmaceutical industry. He held the positions of senior statistician at Burroughs-Wellcome, manager of clinical statistics at A.H. Robins, director of research statistics at SmithKline and French Labs, senior director of GI Clinical Studies, Data Management and Analysis at G.D. Searle, and vice president of worldwide technical operations at Warner Lambert/Parke-Davis. He then founded Biopharmaceutical Research Consultants, Inc. (BRCI), where he held the positions of president, chief executive officer and chief scientific officer.  He has made pivotal contributions in the development and approval of drugs to treat Alzheimer's disease, to prevent and treat gastrointestinal ulcers, to reduce the risk of myocardial infarction, to treat anxiety, depression and panic attacks, to treat hypertension and arthritis and several antibiotics.

 He is or has been a member of several professional and honorary societies, including the American Public Health Association, the American Statistical Association, the Drug Information Association, the Regulatory Affairs Professional Society, the Biometric Society, Technometrics, the American Society for Quality Control, Biometrika, and Kappa Phi Kappa. He is a past member of the Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics, National Research Council, National Academy of Science.

He is the recipient of numerous citations and awards including:

1. The first recipient of the Karl E. Peace Leadership Award from the Gamma Theta Chapter of the Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health
2. 2012 University System of Georgia Board of Regents’ Alumni Hall of Fame Award,
3. Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA),
4. First President’s Medal for outstanding contributions to Georgia Southern University,
5. Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer Scholar,
6. Several distinguished meritorious service awards from the American Public Health   Association, the Drug Information Association, the Southwest GA Cancer Coalition, the Deming Conference, and the International Chinese Statistical Association;
7. Several distinguished alumni awards from the Medical College of Virginia and Georgia Southern University,
8. Deen Day Smith Humanitarian Award,
9. Tito Majaries Lifetime Achievement Award from the Philippine Statistical Association, and
10. Award for outstanding research and scholarly contributions from Georgia Southern University. In addition,
11. His contributions to Education, Public Health and Drug Development have been cited by both the Georgia and US Houses of Representatives, and
12. The American Statistical Association recently created the Karl E. Peace Award for Outstanding Statistical contributions for the Betterment of Society (Marvin Zelen and Fritz Scheuren were the First Recipients).

Dr. Peace is a reviewer or editor of several journals and is the founding editor of the Journal of Biopharmaceutical Statistics, now in its 22th year. He has contributed to the medical, scientific and statistical literature by authoring or co-authoring over 150 articles and 10 books. One of his books, Biopharmaceutical Statistics for Drug Development has been translated into several foreign languages including Japanese, and has been used extensively as ‘the bible for drug development' in the Japanese pharmaceutical industry. He has been Chair of: the Biostatistics Subsection of the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association (PMA), the Biopharmaceutical Section of the ASA, the Training Committee of the PMA Biostatistics Subsection, and the Chair of the Statistics Section of the APHA.

Peace has a lengthy record of philanthropy to education and public health. He has created 21 endowments at five institutions.

- Fourteen of these are at Georgia Southern University, including five for students from his native Baker County, Ga.  Additionally at Georgia Southern, Peace endowed the (i) Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health (JPHCOPH) - the first school of public health in the University System of Georgia; (ii) the first Eminent Scholar Chair (in Biostatistics); (iii) the J.P Hsu/ K.E. Peace Eminent Scholar Chair in Public Health; (iv) founded the Karl E. Peace Center for Biostatistics; (v) the Karl E. Peace Public Health Library, and (vi) brought the Central Office of the International Chinese Statistical Association to the JPHCOPH.

- Two of these are at the University of California at Berkeley, including the JP Hsu/ KE Peace Chair in Biostatistics.

- Three of these are at the VCU School of Medicine (previously the Medical College of Virginia), including the Hans Carter Professorship in Biostatistics.

Peace is also Founder and Chair of the internationally renowned Biopharmaceutical Applied Statistical Symposium (BASS) – which generates funds to support graduate work in Biostatistics. To date, this fund has enabled 50 students to obtain the MPH, Dr.PH, PhD or MD.

Peace also contributed to the growth of  biostatistics and public health in the university system of Georgia (USG). Since he developed the first degree in biostatistics (MPH) and endowed the first school of public health in the USG, other institutions [U GA and Health Sciences University (Medical College of GA)] have instituted degrees in biostatistics and schools or institutes of public health.

In addition, Dr. Peace (1) Funded a cancer screening study (and helped write the protocol) under the auspices of the SW GA Cancer Coalition that led to (his native) Baker County (GA) having the largest screening rates in the nation for breast, colorectal and cervical cancers [received national attention via Sanya Gupta of CNN with interviews of Dr. James Hotz (study director) and Lance Armstrong]; (2) Has worked extensively with the Boys and Girls Club of Bulloch County, GA: As 2010 capital campaign chair for the Club, he issued a challenge to the public that he would match all donations (which led to raising $144,000 for that organization). He also funded 4 interns for the Club that led to an updated computer system which will enable future cost benefit analyses to be conducted. In addition, he often gives talks to the Club and has made numerous in kind donations to that organization. Last summer the Club created the Karl E. Peace Academic Achievement Center. (3) Made donations to the American Public Health Association that allowed students submitting research papers in biostatistics to attend the annual meetings.

Disciplines: Biostatistics

Teaching Interests: Clinical Trial Methodology, Drug Research and Development