Krista Fischer is both a researcher and a teacher on a daily basis. She specializes in biostatistics. This branch of mathematical statistics deals with the application of statistical methods in biology and biomedicine.
Krista liked mathematics as a child. She participated in Olympiads and enjoyed mathematical challenges. However, when she entered university, Krista had to decide whether to study biology or mathematics. Fortunately, she managed to combine the two disciplines.
According to Krista, young girls could definitely be encouraged to take a greater interest in science. Unfortunately, stereotypes are still prevalent that women do not have to understand mathematics/physics or put effort into these subjects - in fact, girls' brains are not built differently in this regard than boys', and innate abilities are distributed equally between the two sexes. Work should be done to eliminate these stereotypes and to encourage girls to test themselves more boldly in science. Perhaps it would also be helpful if young female mathematicians (and other scientists) were more visible and socially active as so-called “role models” for today’s schoolgirls.
According to Krista, the beauty of mathematics lies in its strictly logical system. New knowledge always follows from previous knowledge through logical deductions. However, Krista likes statistics because they also include randomness. Finding connections in complex data sets is exciting, and it is great when mathematical tools can contribute to the creation of new knowledge in medicine, biology and other fields.
In Krista’s opinion, the most exciting area in biostatistics is causal models – for example, she is currently researching with doctoral and master’s students how to assess the causal effect of drugs using existing databases, without organizing expensive and complex drug trials
According to Krista, to succeed as a scientist, you first need interest and motivation to work in your field, as well as hard work and consistency. In addition, a certain amount of creativity is also needed – thinking “outside the box” to achieve new and original results. Speaking of women in science, the Tartu School of Statistics was created by the wonderful Professor Emeritus Ene-Margit Tiit, who always knows how to notice, support and recognize other women among both students and colleagues. That is why there has never been gender inequality among Estonian statisticians. For women, combining work and family life naturally makes life difficult, because with small children there are inevitably breaks in active research. Krista emphasizes that the support and understanding of older colleagues are also important to cope with the dilemmas of combining family and work life as a female scientist.
For Krista, some of the most memorable moments are related to when she, as a supervisor, has managed to arouse interest in biostatistics in young people and they continue in this field after their bachelor’s studies in both master’s and doctoral studies and successfully defend their doctoral thesis. Six young statisticians have achieved doctoral degrees among the bachelor's students supervised by Krista, four of whom she supervised herself.
Source: https://math.ut.ee/et/sisu/naised-teaduses-krista-fischerlink opens on new page
