The NLME package for analyzing mixed-effects models in R and S-PLUS, developed by the authors, provides the underlying software for implementing the methods presented in the text, being described and illustrated in detail throughout the book.

The balanced mix of real data examples, modeling software, and theory makes this book a useful reference for practitioners using mixed-effects models in their data analyses. It can also be used as a text for a one-semester graduate-level applied course in mixed-effects models. Researchers in statistical computing will also find this book appealing for its presentation of novel and efficient computational methods for fitting linear and nonlinear mixed-effects models.

José C. Pinheiro is a Senior Biometrical Fellow at Novartis Pharmaceuticals, having worked at Bell Labs during the time this book was produced. He has published extensively in mixed-effects models, dose finding methods in clinical development, and other areas of biostatistics.

Douglas M. Bates is Professor of Statistics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the author, with Donald G. Watts, of Nonlinear Regression Analysis and Its Applications, a Fellow of the American Statistical Association, and a former chair of the Statistical Computing Section.