Phil Bourne: Dean

Originally from Australia, Bourne got his PhD in physical chemistry from Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia. However in his research in physical chemistry, Bourne got his first look into data science.
“I actually got interested in the computational part of physical chemistry and also the idea that there was a lot of data even then, which was a long time ago, that actually could be mined and used. [This was] data that already existed,” Bourne noted.
From there, his journey to data science took him all over the world. Bourne did his Post Doc research at the University of Sheffield in Sheffield, England. His research focused on molecular structure, specifically protein crystallography.
This took Bourne to San Diego, where he began his work compiling large datasets. While not necessarily referred to as data science then, Bourne was doing the work of a data scientist, while also bringing in his expertise in computational physical chemistry.
“We started building data resources that supported the structural data of proteins and DNA and RNA, and that was called the Protein Data Bank,” Bourne said.
This project, which Bourne worked on for 15 years, has had significant impact in the health industry.
“There isn’t a drug that’s been discovered in the last 20 or 30 years that hasn’t used that resource,” Bourne noted.
The National Institutes of Health observed Bourne’s pivotal role in creating a massive data bank, which has had such positive effect across a variety of fields.
Bourne was then hired by the NIH to be the Director for Data Science in Washington D.C.
“[We had a] goal of bringing data together from disparate sources and making new discoveries that wouldn’t otherwise be possible,” Bourne said of his time at the NIH, working collaboratively across the 27 Institutes there.
Bourne knew, however, that he wanted to return to education. While working on a project for the NIH, called Big Data to Knowledge, he heard about the Data Science Institute, now the School of Data Science, at the University of Virginia.
He was intrigued by the Institute and the unique setup of having an entity on a University that worked collaboratively across Grounds, rather than being nested within an Engineering school, which is common in other educational settings.
In May 2017, Bourne became the Director of the Data Science Institute.
As Bourne had worked collaboratively throughout his career in physical chemistry, biology, protein structure research, and most recently at the NIH, he was enthusiastic about continuing the model of collaboration at UVA.
“The reason I'm encouraged by the idea [collaboration] is because I've seen it between computer science and biology. Coming to UVA was an opportunity to accomplish something great.”
In September of 2019, the Data Science Institute became the School of Data Science through the largest private donation in University history. With this, Bourne became the Stephenson Dean of the School of Data Science through a $3 million gift from Beth and Scott Stephenson.
Collaboration and interdisciplinary work has been at the heart of the School of Data Science. This twelfth school at UVA has been deemed “A School Without Walls,” for that exact reason.