SSA VIC & TAS and MLAI Meetup Seminar: Inferring Time of Infection Based on Antibody Data Through a Hierarchical Bayesian Framework

The Victorian and Tasmanian Branch of the Statistical Society of Australia and the Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence (MLAI) Meetup are holding a joint in-person event on Tuesday 21st April 6pm AEST in Melbourne with a presentation by Felicia Bongiovanni, a PhD candidate at The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.

Date: Tuesday 21st April 2026

Venue: Community Hub at the Dock, 912 Collins St, Docklands

Agenda:

• 6:00 - 6:20: Socializing
• 6:20 - 6:40: Announcements and AI news
• 6:40 - 7:40: Talk(s) and Q&A
• 7:40 - 8:00 Networking
• 8:00: Head to the nearest pub for dinner

Title: Inferring Time of Infection Based on Antibody Data Through a Hierarchical Bayesian Framework.

Time-since-event prediction is a powerful tool to reconstruct histories of an event. It is commonly used in biomedicine to predict the beginning of tumor growth, to predict how long ago someone was infected with a disease, and even to predict the time since death for criminal investigations. Inference through Bayesian statistics and mathematical modelling can allow for time-since-event prediction and provide insight into the mechanisms driving an event. Machine learning is also used for time-since-event prediction but lacks the mechanistic insight Bayesian inference can provide. However, Bayesian inference, especially through Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods, can be computationally expensive and time-consuming. In this talk, I describe a method for combining Bayesian inference with machine learning to improve computational efficiency while also maintaining mechanistic insight. This is demonstrated through the case study of estimating time-since-infection using antibody data.

Bio: Felicia Bongiovanni

Felicia is a PhD candidate at The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research where she is conducting mathematical modelling of the immune response to understand more about infectious disease dynamics. In another life, she was a data analyst for the National Health Funding Body in Canberra through the Australia Bureau of Statistics Data Graduate Program. Felicia was awarded the SSA Vic & Tas Recognition of Impact Award in 2025 which funded her trip to the Australian Statistical Conference in Perth.

Dinner Offer
If you’re an ECSS or Transitional SSA member, please register via the SSA website to receive a free meal at the pub after the talk. Tickets are limited, so only register if you plan to attend.
Other members are not eligible for the free meal and do not need to register through the SSA website. However, please register for the event here: https://www.meetup.com/machine-learning-ai-meetup/events/313388763/