Francesca Dominici is a Harvard Professor who develops methodology in causal inference and data science and leads research projects that combine

big data Big data primarily refers to data sets that are too large or complex to be dealt with by traditional data processing, data-processing application software, software. Data with many entries (rows) offer greater statistical power, while data with ...

with

health policy Health policy can be defined as the "decisions, plans, and actions that are undertaken to achieve specific healthcare goals within a society".World Health Organization''Health Policy'' accessed 22 March 2011(archived 5 February 2011) According ...

and

climate change Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...

. She is a professor of biostatistics, director of the Harvard Data Science Initiative, and a former senior associate dean for research in the

Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health is the public health school at Harvard University, located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. It was named after Hong Kong entrepreneur Chan Tseng-hsi in 2014 following a US$350 ...

Education and career

Dominici earned a bachelor's degree in statistics from

Sapienza University of Rome The Sapienza University of Rome (), formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", abbreviated simply as Sapienza ('Wisdom'), is a Public university, public research university located in Rome, Italy. It was founded in 1303 and is ...

in 1993, and a Ph.D. in statistics from the

University of Padua The University of Padua (, UNIPD) is an Italian public research university in Padua, Italy. It was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from the University of Bologna, who previously settled in Vicenza; thus, it is the second-oldest ...

in 1997. She was a professor of

biostatistics Biostatistics (also known as biometry) is a branch of statistics that applies statistical methods to a wide range of topics in biology. It encompasses the design of biological experiments, the collection and analysis of data from those experimen ...

at the

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health is the public health graduate school of Johns Hopkins University, a private university, private research university primarily based in Baltimore, Maryland. It was founded as the Johns Hopkins ...

from 1997 to 2009, with a joint appointment in

epidemiology Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution (who, when, and where), patterns and Risk factor (epidemiology), determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population, and application of this knowledge to prevent dise ...

. On moving to Harvard in 2009, she was also given an honorary Master of Public Health degree from Harvard, following the tradition that Harvard faculty must have Harvard degrees.

Contributions

Dominici has been active on many study committees on public health, organized by the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...

, and others. As well, she has taken an active role in the status of university women. Her work on the Johns Hopkins University Committee on the Status of Women earned her the campus Diversity Recognition Award in 2009; at the Chan School of Public Health, she has led the Committee for the Advancement of Women Faculty since 2012.

Recognition

In 2024, Dominici was named to TIME100's inaugural Health list. TIME100 Health recognized her for her groundbreaking contributions to global health. Dominici became a

fellow of the American Statistical Association Like many other academic professional societies, the American Statistical Association (ASA) uses the title of Fellow of the American Statistical Association as its highest honorary grade of membership. The designation of ASA Fellow has been a sign ...

in 2005. She is also a Fellow of the

Institute of Mathematical Statistics The Institute of Mathematical Statistics is an international professional and scholarly society devoted to the development, dissemination, and application of statistics and probability. The Institute currently has about 4,000 members in all parts ...

, and was elected to the

National Academy of Medicine The National Academy of Medicine (NAM), known as the Institute of Medicine (IoM) until 2015, is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Medicine is a part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineerin ...

in 2018. In 2006, she won the Mortimer Spiegelman Award of the

American Public Health Association The American Public Health Association (APHA) is a Washington, D.C.–based professional membership and advocacy organization for public health professionals in the United States. APHA is the largest professional organization of public health pr ...

. She is the 2015 winner of the Florence Nightingale David Award of the

Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies The Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS) comprises the presidents, past presidents and presidents-elect of the following, primarily Northern American, professional societies of statisticians: * American Statistical Association * ...

, and the 2016 winner of the

University of Alabama at Birmingham The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) is a public research university in Birmingham, Alabama, United States. Founded in 1969 and part of the University of Alabama System, UAB has grown to be the state's largest employer, with more than ...

's Janet L. Norwood Award for Outstanding Achievement in Statistical Sciences, which honors a woman statistician for achievement. In 2020, she won the National Institute of Statistical Sciences (NISS) Jerome Sacks Award for Outstanding Cross-Disciplinary Research.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dominici, Francesca Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American statisticians Italian statisticians Italian women statisticians Sapienza University of Rome alumni University of Padua alumni Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health faculty Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health faculty Fellows of the American Statistical Association Fellows of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics Members of the National Academy of Medicine