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

big data Though used sometimes loosely partly because of a lack of formal definition, the interpretation that seems to best describe Big data is the one associated with large body of information that we could not comprehend when used only in smaller am ...

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(Web archive)/ref> According to the ...

and

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

. She is a professor of biostatistics, co-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 of Harvard University, located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. The school grew out of the Harvard-MIT School for Health Officers, the nation's first ...

Education and career

Dominici earned a bachelor's degree in statistics from

Sapienza University of Rome The Sapienza University of Rome ( it, Sapienza – Università di Roma), also called simply Sapienza or the University of Rome, and formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a Public university, public research university l ...

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

University of Padua The University of Padua ( it, Università degli Studi di Padova, UNIPD) is an Italian university located in the city of Padua, region of Veneto, northern Italy. The University of Padua was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from B ...

in 1997. She was a professor of

biostatistics Biostatistics (also known as biometry) are the development and application of 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 experime ...

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 research university in Baltimore, Maryland. As the second independent, degree-granting institution for research in epi ...

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 determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population. It is a cornerstone of public health, and shapes policy decisions and evidenc ...

. 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, 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 Nati ...

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

, 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

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 number of new fellows per year is limited ...

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 o ...

, and was elected to the

National Academy of Medicine The National Academy of Medicine (NAM), formerly called 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, En ...

in 2018. In 2006, she won the Mortimer Spiegelman Award of the American Public Health Association. She is the 2015 winner of the

Florence Nightingale David Award The Florence Nightingale David Award is an award given every two years (in odd-numbered years) jointly by the Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies and Caucus for Women in Statistics to a distinguished female statistician. Description ...

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 university#United States, public List of research universities in the United States, research university in Birmingham, Alabama. Developed from an academic extension center established i ...

'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 Women statisticians Sapienza University of Rome alumni University of Padua alumni Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health faculty Harvard 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