Donald E. Brown

Don Brown is the senior advisor to the dean and a Quantitative Foundation Distinguished Professor in Data Science. He is also the William Stansfield Calcott Professor of Systems and Information Engineering. Brown is the founding director of the Data Science Institute and former co-director of the Translational Health Institute of Virginia. He is director of the Research Experiences in Genomic Applications of Responsible Data Science (REGARDS) program in the School of Data Science. He serves on the National Academy Committee on Emerging Trends in Aviation Safety.

Brown’s research interests include applied machine learning, data fusion, knowledge discovery, and simulation optimization with applications to healthcare and security. Brown is the past president of Commonwealth Computer Research, Inc., which provides data analysis and technical services for numerous private and governmental organizations. He is a former fellow at the National Institute of Justice Crime Mapping Research Center and former member of the Joint Directors of Laboratories Group on Data Fusion.

Brown has received numerous awards for his research and teaching. He is the recipient of the Norbert Wiener Award for Outstanding Research in the areas of systems engineering, data fusion, and information analysis. He has also received an Outstanding Contribution Award from that society and the IEEE Millennium Medal. He received the UVA Distinguished Research Award in 2023. The student chapter of the International Council on Systems Engineering has named him the best undergraduate teacher three years in a row (2001, 2002, and 2003). He also co-edited the book, “Operations Research and Artificial Intelligence: The Integration of Problem Solving Strategies and Intelligent Scheduling Systems.” 

Brown holds a Ph.D. in Industrial and Operations Engineering from the University of Michigan. He obtained an M.S. in Operations Research and an M.E. in Industrial Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. Brown earned his B.S. from the United States Military Academy at West Point and served in the U.S. Army.