Timothy Lant

Timothy Lant, PhD, MAS, is the Director of Data, Analytics, and Coordination for the Arizona State University Health Observatory.  With more than 25 years of experience in government, academic, think-tank, corporate and nonprofit positions, Lant’s areas of professional expertise are in mathematical epidemiology, public health, emergency preparedness and response, data science, artificial intelligence, machine learning, information technology, risk and threat assessments, and policy analysis. 

In his current role, Lant is responsible for leading ASU's Health Data Ecosystem - a collection of public health and medical data records, information technology systems, and computing resources dedicated to improving health for all of Arizona and beyond.  Lant leads a team of data scientists, AI developers, analysts, epidemiologists, and program managers to deliver programs and services to Arizona State University and external partners in government, non-profit sector, and industry. Lant leads multiple projects in infectious disease modeling, hospital preparedness, bioinformatics, artificial intelligence, population health, and health outcomes.  

Prior to re-joining ASU in 2017, Lant was director of the Division of Analytic Decision Support, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). His primary responsibilities included leading HHS efforts to assess medical and public health consequences for disease outbreaks, chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defense terrorism and pandemic influenza. He also developed scenario-based and initial capabilities assessments, product specific requirements and requests for proposals across a multi-billion-dollar portfolio of medical countermeasures. Lant also led multiple inter-agency boards and committees related to medical and public health preparedness planning and acquisition of required products and services. He has worked extensively with the U.S. federal interagency, the White House and national labs. Lant created and led the HHS 2014 Ebola Modeling Coordination Group charged with developing analysis products and requirements with diverse stakeholder groups within federal, state, local and international organizations.

Lant earned a doctorate in applied mathematics, a Master of Actuarial Science (Risk) degree and has continuing education in policy analysis and biological threats. He has authored dozens of presentations, reports, policy briefings and peer-reviewed journal articles on exercise design and assessment, emergency management, resource management and modeling and simulation. Audiences for Lant’s work include the general public, first responders, public officials and academic/policy researchers.