Founding Dean Bourne Named Recipient of ISCB Outstanding Service Award

Earlier this year, the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) named Philip E. Bourne, founding dean of the University of Virginia School of Data Science, the recipient of its Outstanding Service Award, honoring his impact on the field. He had been set to receive the award this summer.

Bourne, who died March 8 from mesothelioma, was past president of ISCB and former publications committee chair.

“He was a truly influential member of ISCB, always lending his experience and expertise for the betterment of the society,” ISCB stated on a March 11 LinkedIn post. “We’re grateful to have gotten the chance to speak with him about the award and his contributions to computational biology.”

The ISCB award announcement describes Bourne as “a biomedical data scientist whose work advances open, collaborative data science to drive discovery and address complex societal challenges.”

Bourne was named an ISCB Fellow and achieved senior member designation for his sustained contributions to the field of computational biology and to ISCB.

Founded in 1997, the ISCB is a global organization dedicated to advancing computational biology and bioinformatics. An article about Bourne will be featured later this year in the open access ISMB 2026 Conference Supplement in Bioinformatics.