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UF Health University of Florida
College of Public Health & Health Professions University of Florida
Spring Graduation Information
About Overview

Artificial Intelligence at PHHP

AI for the public’s health

Researchers in the College of Public Health and Health Professions are using artificial intelligence tools to improve population health and treatment interventions.

Research Themes

Applied AI

Studies led by faculty in both public health and health professions disciplines explore real-world health issues, including the outcomes of pharmaceutical treatments in large populations, the effects of re-purposing drugs for other health conditions, the impact of environmental contaminants on the risk of diseases, such as cancer, and the use of assistive technology to improve daily life for older adults and people with disabilities.

Ethical AI

Scientists are developing fair and equitable models that not only recognize social bias and health disparity, but also can be acted upon in interventions. Examples include increasing access to care for vulnerable and underserved populations and reducing stigma in order to improve quality of life for people living with HIV.

Interdisciplinary AI

Research across disciplines includes fusing molecular epidemiology and deep learning methods to track and curb transmission of infectious diseases, as well as AI-empowered neurocognitive research.  

Methodological AI

Methodological approaches include advancements in machine learning and “causal AI” with strong biostatistical foundations, such as efficient multi-omics big data analysis, deep propensity networks, automated learning of causal effects from large-scale electronic health records, multi-site large clinical trials, and Bayesian dynamic trials.

PHHP AI Leadership

Associate Dean of Artificial Intelligence

Mattia Prosperi

Mattia Prosperi Ph.D., FAMIA, FACMI

Professor and Associate Dean for AI and Innovation; EPI Chief Research Information Officer
Department: College of Public Health and Health Professions Dean's Office
Phone: (352) 273-5860
Email: m.prosperi@ufl.edu
CV: View Curriculum Vitae:
Mailing Address:
PO Box 100231
2004 MOWRY RD RM 4234
 GAINESVILLE FL 32610
Physical Address:
2004 MOWRY RD
 GAINESVILLE FL 32610

Mattia Prosperi, Ph.D., FAMIA, FACMI, is a professor and associate dean for AI and innovation at the University of Florida College of Public Health and Health Professions and the chief research information officer for UF’s Emerging Pathogens Institute (EPI). With a background in computer engineering, he has over two decades of experience in bio-health informatics and epidemiology, leading impactful research programs in both the U.S. and the E.U.

In his role as associate dean, he focuses on expanding AI infrastructure, training/education and research capacity within the college and across UF. As EPI’s chief research information officer, he leads efforts to enhance pathogenomics-centered data integration, reproducible bioinformatics pipelines, and guides the development of novel biological generative AI.

His research integrates AI, health and epidemiological informatics, causal inference and multimodal data science. Over the past decade, Dr. Prosperi has secured funding and led projects totaling more than $20 million in external support from U.S. federal agencies, (including the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation), the European Commission (Horizon 2020); not-for-profit foundations; and industry partners such as Merck and NVIDIA.

Dr. Prosperi has advanced both foundational and applied biomedical AI. His work includes developing multidomain, multilevel modeling approaches that fuse socioeconomic, ecological, clinical, and -omics data to enable precision health. More recently, he has pioneered causal AI methods aimed at shaping future outcomes rather than merely predicting them.

He serves as editor for the journals BMC Artificial Intelligence, Global Health Research and Policy, Journal of Healthcare Informatics Research, and BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making. He is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, and a Fellow of both the American Medical Informatics Association and the American College of Medical Informatics.

Accomplishments:
  • Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (FACMI)
    2024 · American College of Medical Informatics
  • Fellow of the American Medical Informatics Association (FAMIA)
    2022 · American Medical Informatics Association
Research Summary:

Computational epidemiology Bio-health informatics Artificial intelligence Viral – bacterial diseases

Publications:
Grants:
  • Sep 2025 ACTIVE
    An AI-based behavioral intervention to improve pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV prevention
    MIRIAM HOSPITAL · Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2025 ACTIVE
    Harnessing big data to understand the confluence of HIV and cancer stigma in the US Southeast
    H LEE MOFFITT CANCER CTR & RES INST · Principal Investigator
  • Jan 2025 ACTIVE
    Interoperable phenotyping of high impact chronic pain tailored to rehabilitation
    BROOKS REHABILITATION CLINICAL RES CNTR · Principal Investigator
  • Jan 2025 ACTIVE
    Utilizing phylodynamic and causal artificial intelligence methods for predicting and characterizing antibiotic resistant bacterial transmission within and beyond hospital settings
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Other
  • Oct 2024 ACTIVE
    Genomic characterization of antimicrobial resistance and viral co-infection patterns of Streptococcus pneumoniae by next-generation sequencing and artificial intelligence.
    MERCK SHARP & DOHME · Co-Investigator
  • Sep 2024 ACTIVE
    Precision HIV Prevention: Piloting a youth learning health community
    FL STATE UNIV · Co-Investigator
  • Jul 2024 ACTIVE
    AI-based Clinical decision support to idenTify wOmeN for HIV testing and PrEP in Florida (ACTION-HIV)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIMH · Co-Investigator
  • Jun 2024 ACTIVE
    Machine learning-based brain aging morphological signatures of chronic musculoskeletal pain
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIA · Other
  • May 2024 – Feb 2025
    Understanding the Impact of Obesogenic Environments on the Incidence of Colorectal Cancer
    FL DEPT OF HLTH BANKHEAD-COLEY CANCER RE · Co-Investigator
  • Apr 2024 – Jun 2025
    Collaboration with UCLA and Dr. Lucero
    UNIV OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES · Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2023 – Apr 2024
    Iron-CLAD: securely advancing AoU participant characterization with proven platforms and collaborations (All of Us Center for Linkage and Acquisition of Data (CLAD))
    UNIV OF COLORADO DENVER & ANSCHUTZ MED · Project Manager
  • Jun 2023 ACTIVE
    A mixed methods study of factors associated with HIV outcomes in people living with HIV
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIDA · Other
  • Apr 2023 ACTIVE
    Artificial Intelligence and Counterfactually Actionable Responses to End HIV (AICARE-HIV)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Principal Investigator
  • Jan 2023 – Jun 2024
    Twitter networks and dynamics of discussions related to pesticides
    *SYNGENTA CROP PROTECTION LLC · Principal Investigator
  • Nov 2022 – Nov 2024
    Interest and uptake of long-acting antiretroviral therapy (ART) among people with HIV in Florida
    MERCK AND COMPANY INC RES LAB · Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2022 – Dec 2023
    Workshop on AI Governance in For-profit and Not-for-profit Organizations
    NATL SCIENCE FOU · Co-Project Director/Principal Investigator
  • Aug 2022 – Jul 2025
    CODUS – HIV outcome quality measure evaluation and stigma
    FL DEPT OF HLTH · Principal Investigator
  • Jul 2022 ACTIVE
    A Phylodynamic Artificial Intelligence framework to predict evolution of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern in Immunocompromised persons with HIV (PhAI-CoV)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2021 ACTIVE
    Southern HIV and Alcohol Research Consortium Biomedical Data Repository
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAAA · Co-Investigator
  • Sep 2021 ACTIVE
    Interventions to improve alcohol-related comorbidities along the gut-brain axis in persons with HIV infection
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAAA · Co-Investigator
  • Jun 2021 – Aug 2022
    Expanding genomic surveillance and epidemiology capacity in Central Florida and Southeastern US
    THE ROCKEFELLER FOU · Co-Investigator
  • May 2021 – Apr 2022
    Evaluating Public Perception of Pesticides Using Social Media Data Analysis
    *SYNGENTA CROP PROTECTION LLC · Principal Investigator
  • Apr 2021 – Mar 2025
    Advancing Interdisciplinary Science of Aging through Identification of Iatrogenic Complications: The UF EHR Clinical Data Infrastructure for Enhanced Patient Safety among the Elderly (UF-ECLIPSE)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIA · Co-Investigator
  • Jan 2021 ACTIVE
    SCH: INT: Enabling real-time surveillance of antimicrobial resistance
    NATL SCIENCE FOU · Co-Project Director/Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2020 ACTIVE
    Using Real-world Data to Assess the Burden of Diabetes in Children and Adolescents in Florida
    CTRS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION · Co-Investigator
  • Aug 2020 – Jan 2024
    Using Electronic Health Records from a Large Clinical Data Research Network to Understand Cancer Burden and Cancer Risks Among Transgender and Gender Nonconforming (TGNC) Individuals
    NATL INST OF HLTH NCI · Co-Investigator
  • May 2020 – Mar 2022
    Spatiotemporal analysis of HIV health and quality of life outcomes in Florida
    FL DEPT OF HLTH · Principal Investigator
  • May 2020 ACTIVE
    Forecasting trajectories of HIV transmission networks with a novel phylodynamic and deep learning framework
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Principal Investigator
  • Apr 2020 – Mar 2023
    RAPID: Dynamic Identification of SARS-COV-2 Transmission Epicenters in Presence of Spatial Heterogeneity (COV-DYNAMITE)
    NATL SCIENCE FOU · Principal Investigator
  • Dec 2019 – Nov 2023
    Artificial Intelligence-aided Personalization on Dual Antiplatelet Therapy for Patients Underwent Coronary Stent Implantation Using Large-scale Electronic Health Records
    UNIV OF TEXAS HLTH SCI CTR AT HOUSTON · Co-Investigator
  • Oct 2019 – May 2020
    Miami Center for AIDS Research
    UNIV OF MIAMI · Principal Investigator
  • Apr 2019 – Mar 2021
    Advancing Interdisciplinary Science of Aging through Identification of Iatrogenic Complications: The UF EHR Clinical Data Infrastructure for Enhanced Patient Safety among the Elderly (UF-ECLIPSE)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIA · Co-Investigator
  • Jan 2019 – Dec 2021
    Management of Standardized Evaluation of Retroviral HIV Infection
    FONDAZIONE M.I.S.I. · Principal Investigator
  • Nov 2018 – Oct 2025
    Developing Computational Methods for Surveillance of Antimicrobial Resistant Agents
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Principal Investigator
  • May 2018 – Mar 2020
    Spatiotemporal analysis of HIV drug resistance in Florida
    FL DEPT OF HLTH · Principal Investigator
  • Feb 2018 – Jan 2022
    HIV Dynamic Modelling for Identification of Transmission Epicenters (HIV-DYNAMITE)
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Principal Investigator
  • Sep 2017 – Jun 2024
    Viral evolution in peripheral macrophages and brain during progression to AIDS
    NATL INST OF HLTH NINDS · Co-Investigator
  • Sep 2017 – Aug 2022
    A Person-Centric Prediction Model of Job Loss based on Social Media Data and Linguistic and Linguistic Analytics
    NATL SCIENCE FOU · Principal Investigator
  • May 2017 – May 2020
    Miscellaneous Donors
    MISCELLANEOUS DONORS · Principal Investigator
  • Mar 2017 – Dec 2018
    Strengthening the UF Health Nursing Academic Partnership Phase IV: Generating Practice-Based Evidence for Quality Improvement (Stage 2)
    UF HEALTH SHANDS HOSPITAL · Co-Investigator
  • Jun 2016 – Oct 2017
    Mapping and modeling Bacillus anthracis and Clostridiumbotulinum across North Africa and the Middle East with high resolutiongenetic sequencing and spatial analysis.
    US DEPT OF HOMELAND SECURITY · Project Manager
  • Apr 2016 – Mar 2018
    Enhancing Population Impact of HIV Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis Implementation
    BROWN UNIV · Principal Investigator
  • Jan 2016 – Dec 2018
    Big data approach for correlating gut microbiota with epithelial methylation pattern
    NATL INST OF HLTH NCI · Principal Investigator
  • Jan 2016 – Dec 2021
    ufhcc-ioa cancer-aging collaborative team grants
    UF HEALTH SHANDS HOSPITAL · Project Manager
  • Jul 2015 – Jul 2016
    EuResist Engine retraining
    EURESIST NETWORK GEIE · Principal Investigator
  • Jun 2015 – May 2018
    Virus discovery and epidemic tracing from high throughput metagenomic sequencing
    EUROPEAN COMMISSION · Principal Investigator
  • Mar 2015 – Mar 2018
    Management of standardized evaluation of retroviral HIV infection
    FONDAZIONE M.I.S.I. · Principal Investigator
  • Dec 2011 – Jun 2016
    Cholera Transmission in Gressier Region, Haiti
    NATL INST OF HLTH NIAID · Project Manager
Education:
  • 2008
    Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science Engineering and Automation
    Roma Tre University
  • 2003
    Master's in Computer Science Engineering
    Roma Tre University

Learn more about artificial intelligence at PHHP from Associate Dean Mattia Prosperi.

AI Hires

Aprinda I Queen
Department: Department of Clinical and Health Psychology

Aprinda I Queen Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
Phone: (352) 294-8990
Takis Benos
Department: Department of Epidemiology

Takis Benos

William Bushnell Presidential Chaired Professor
Li Chen
Department: PHHP-COM BIOSTATISTICS

Li Chen

Associate Professor; Associate Director of Bioinformatics at UF CASBR; Scientific Director of Bioinformatics at UF MBI
Phone: (352) 294-5909
Joseph M Gullett
Department: Department of Clinical and Health Psychology

Joseph M Gullett Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
Phone: (352) 294-8631
Noah Hammarlund
Department: HP-HEALTH SERVICES ADMIN

Noah Hammarlund

AST PROF
Phone: (352) 273-6073
Zhoumeng Lin
Department: Department of Environmental and Global Health

Zhoumeng Lin BMed, PhD, DABT, CPH, ERT, ATS

Associate Professor
Phone: (352) 273-6160
Feifei Xiao
Department: PHHP-COM BIOSTATISTICS

Feifei Xiao

Associate Professor
Phone: (352) 294-5917
Reem Waziry
Department: Department of Epidemiology

Reem Waziry

Assistant Professor
Phone: (352) 273-5362

PHHP Artificial Intelligence Work Group and Events

UF PHHP

Artificial Intelligence Work Group

The UF-PHHP-AI-WG is designed to bring together interdisciplinary expertise, foster novel ideas and engage both established and early career investigators.

Learn more about the AI Work Group
collage of classroom settings

UF PHHP workgroup

AI Seminar Series

The University of Florida College of Public Health and Health Professions Artificial Intelligence Work Group is pleased to host presentations from renowned experts in health care and public health AI. These presentations are free and open to the campus community.

Learn more about the AI Seminar Series
CTRB

Annual AI Workshop

DAISY

DAISY is a highly interdisciplinary event whose main theme evolves every year based on top AI trends and challenges. Over the past five years, DAISY has covered personalized AI, bias in AI, and governance in AI — across medicine, public health, and business perspectives.

2025 DAISY Workshop
DAISY Workshop logo on white background

Funding Opportunities

FACULTY SUPPORT

PHHP Research Innovation Fund

The Innovation Fund is designed to provide funding to PHHP faculty for pilot/feasibility studies to enhance their opportunity for obtaining extramural research funding. The program is organized around three major themes: artificial intelligence, direct clinical impact and general topics in public health and health professions.

Learn more

Ph.D. student support

Ph.D. Fellowship in Artificial Intelligence

The PHHP Ph.D. Fellowship in Artificial Intelligence program fosters doctoral students’ training and research in AI and encourages out-of-the-box ideas. The awards are designed to offer an opportunity for academic growth, professional networking, results dissemination and research support for students and mentors.

Applications for the 2026-2027 cycle will be accepted December 1, 2025 – January 16, 2026.

View application instructions

Professional doctoral support

Professional Doctoral Fellowship in Artificial Intelligence

The PHHP Professional Doctoral Fellowship in Artificial Intelligence (AI) aims at fostering students’ training and applied research in AI, relative to topics in public health and health professions. The long-term goal is to build a legacy of excellence in AI for the PHHP Professional Doctoral programs with national and international recognition. In the short-term, the awards provide an opportunity for completing specific projects in line with the student’s coursework and professional growth.

Applications are accepted year-round.

View application instructions

Education

Undergraduate

The college has launched a certificate program for undergrads titled Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare and Public Health. The nine-credit certificate includes three courses: “Higher Thinking for Healthy Humans: AI in Healthcare and Public Health,” “Ethics in AI: Who’s Protecting Our Health” and “Data Visualization in the Health Sciences.”

Read more

Graduate

The college has launched a certificate in Artificial Intelligence Research Methodologies in Healthcare and Public Health for graduate students that will focus on using AI to answer health-related research questions. Once these are fully established, the courses will be developed and submitted to the Graduate Council for approval.

Actively Enrolling! Apply Now

UF Health IDR ATLAS Health Data Research Platform

UF Health IDR ATLAS Health Data Research Platform

ATLAS is a free, publicly available, web-based tool developed by the Observational Health Data Sciences and Informatics (OHDSI) community with the aim to facilitate the design and execution of analyses on standardized, patient-level, observational data. If you are familiar with i2b2, ATLAS can be considered its evolved version, overcoming many of i2b2’s limitations.

Visit site

AI News

PHHP, EPI host workshop on AI for infection…

UF researchers trained international graduate students and researchers on how to use AI to predict, prepare for and respond to infectious disease…

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UF AI workshop examines the intersection of…

The fifth annual DAISY workshop brought together students, faculty and a biotech industry leader to discuss AI collaboration between academia and…

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A group of four people (a man on the left and three women) wearing business clothes are seated in brown chairs in front of a white pull-down projector screen. A person in the foreground is seated facing them, to the bottom left of the frame, and is out of focus.

Newest upgrades to UF’s HiPerGator supercharge…

The new computing power will accelerate artificial intelligence education and research at PHHP, where faculty members are pioneering AI methods to…

Read Story
Close-up view of HiPerGator's neatly organized aqua-colored network cables connected to ports on a server rack,

News In Brief

  1. Xiangren (Florence) Wang receives national award for AI cancer research
  2. Zhoumeng Lin achieves Academy of Toxicological Sciences Fellow status
  3. Biostatistics Ph.D. students present at international bioinformatics…
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