Headshot of Nicole Kogan

Nicole Kogan

PhD Candidate
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Nicole is a PhD candidate in Population Health Sciences (infectious disease epidemiology concentration), advised by Dr. Mauricio Santillana. Her research interests center on digital epidemiology, particularly the creation and application of machine intelligence methods that leverage disparate digital data sources to augment infectious disease surveillance infrastructure. Prior to her PhD, Nicole held a number of positions in the biotech sector. She received her B.S. in biological engineering from MIT.

Diego (Yizhi) Liang

Masters Student
Global Health and Population

Diego Liang is a master’s student in Global Health and Population working with Dr. Minttu Rönn investigating racial/ethnic disparities in congenital syphilis. They are also examining heterogeneity in HIV acquisition risk among people who inject drugs (PWID) in the United States. Apart from his current research, Diego is also interested in using the value of information techniques to quantify decision uncertainty in real-world settings. Diego earned his BS in Public…

Alicia Madden

Masters Student
Department of Epidemiology

Alicia Madden is a second-year Master of Science student in Megan Murray’s research group at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a B.A. in Molecular and Cell Biology, and she has previously done HIV protein crystallography and research on SARS-CoV-2 population immunity. Alicia hopes to draw from both immunology and epidemiology to understand emerging infectious diseases. She is currently…

Tigist Menkir

Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Tigist is a doctoral student studying infectious disease epidemiology, advised by Dr. Caroline Buckee. Her research interests lie in the application of diverse statistical tools – including machine learning-based methods, spatial statistics, and traditional dynamic models – for infectious disease surveillance, with a focus on data-limited settings and marginalized populations. Prior to joining Harvard, she received her A.B. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, with certificates (minors) in Global Health and…

Headshot of Eva Rumpler

Eva Rumpler

PhD Student
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Eva is a PhD student in Population Health Sciences concentrating in infectious disease epidemiology, advised by Dr. Marc Lipsitch. She previously graduated from the Master of Science in infectious disease epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and worked at CCDD as a research assistant on COVID-19 modelling projects. Prior to coming to Harvard, she studied public policy and global health at SciencesPo and biology at Sorbonne…

Beau Schaeffer photo

Beau Schaeffer

PhD Student
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Beau Schaeffer is a second year PhD student studying infectious disease epidemiology under the mentorship of Dr. Bill Hanage. He holds a B.S. in Microbiology from The University of Alabama and an S.M. in Epidemiology from the Harvard Chan School. Currently, his research interests include exploring pathogen evolution at the within-host and population level as well as applying causal inference methods to infectious disease problems.

Ye Shen

PhD Student
Health Policy

Ye Shen is a Ph.D. candidate in the Decision Sciences track of the Health Policy program at Harvard University. She is interested in using disease simulation models and decision analytic methods to better inform health policy topics intersecting the social safety net for underserved and vulnerable populations. She is currently developing a disease simulation model of dental caries progression and conducting decision analyses of strategies to scale up delivery of…

Headshot of Alex Zapf

Alex Zapf

PhD Student
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Alexander John Zapf (He/Him/His) – Alex is an epidemiologist from northern Germany and previously studied at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences, University of Oxford, and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Alex earned graduate degrees in global health science and global disease epidemiology and control, and his experience spans national disease surveillance, disease modeling, and pandemic response research. His primary research interests include infectious disease epidemiology, public…

Ziyuan Zhang

Masters Student
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology

Ziyuan is a Master of Science student in Epidemiology with infectious disease track, advised by Dr. Marc Lipsitch. He graduated from UC Berkeley, where he double majored in Data Science and Public Health. Before joining Harvard, he engaged in research related to suicide disclosure and interventions, substance abuse, and vaccination administration policy.