Jonna Mazet

Last updated
Jonna Ann Keener Mazet
Jonna Mazet.jpg
Jonna Mazet on the University of California, Davis campus in October of 2019
Born (1967-12-18) December 18, 1967 (age 56)
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater UC Davis
AwardsTEDMED Hive Innovator (2018)
Scientific career
Fields Epidemiology, Disease ecology
InstitutionsUC Davis

Jonna Ann Keener Mazet (born December 18, 1967) is an American veterinarian, epidemiologist and a Distinguished Professor of Epidemiology and Disease Ecology at the University of California, Davis. Since 2021, she has served as the Vice Provost of Grand Challenges at the University of California, Davis where she provides leadership for transdisciplinary research and solution-oriented activities dedicated to global health problem solving across (e.g. “wicked problems”). UC Davis Grand Challenges focuses on developing climate solutions, preventing and responding to emerging health threats, promoting sustainable food systems, and reimagining the role of land-grant universities. Dr. Mazet is known for her long-standing achievements and contributions to operationalizing the One Health approach, which is now a key component of the Quadripartite Organizations core mandates for addressing health challenges. [1] In 2009, Dr. Mazet founded the One Health Institute at the University of California, Davis and served as the Executive Director until July 2020. Recognized for her innovative and holistic approach to emerging environmental and global health threats, she is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Contents

Mazet is a leader in the field of One Health and is active in international research programs, most notably in relation to disease transmission among wildlife, domestic animals, and people and the ecological drivers of disease emergence. [2] One Health is the collaborative effort across multiple disciplines (veterinary, human medical, environmental, etc.) to attain optimal health for animals, people, and the environment. As a member of the National Academy of Medicine, Mazet also chaired the National Academies’ One Health Action Collaborative and serves on the Forum for Microbial Threats. [3] She is the founding chair of the One Health Action Collaborative (2016 - 2023) and previously chaired the Interest Group on Global Health, Infectious Diseases, and Microbiology (2017 - 2019) . She serves as a member of the National Academies’ Standing Committee on Emerging Infectious Diseases and 21st Century Threats.

From October 2009-September 2020 she was the Global Director of the PREDICT Project, a more than $200 million viral emergence early-warning project that was developed with the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Emerging Pandemic Threats Program. She was also the Director of the One Health Workforce - Next Generation project from October 2019-April 2021.

Mazet was born and raised in Marin County, California and currently lives both there and in Davis, California, USA with her husband. She has two daughters.

Education and early career

Mazet earned her Bachelor of Science in Veterinary Medicine from the University of California, Davis in 1990 and her Master of Preventive Veterinary Medicine in Wildlife and Infectious Disease and her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine in 1992. In 1996, she completed a PhD in epidemiology, expanding her training across human and animal species divides. [4]

Mazet worked as a wildlife veterinarian for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife where she was instrumental in the development of California’s Oiled Wildlife Care Network (OWCN). [5] While working as an oil spill responder, she advanced the collaborative Network, making it a model for wildlife emergency management systems worldwide, and remains a consulting expert on animal emergency preparedness and response.

She joined the faculty of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine in 1998 and became Co-director of the fledgling Wildlife Health Center and moved the headquarters of the OWCN to the university.

In 2009, she became Executive Director of the newly formed UC Davis One Health Institute, which is home to programs and projects that do work around the world, including the Karen C. Drayer Wildlife Health Center, PREDICT Project, Gorilla Doctors, SeaDoc Society, EpiCenter for Disease Dynamics and the California Raptor Center.

Viral discovery and pandemic preparedness

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Mazet gave more than 65 Keynote & Invited presentations across national and international assemblies. Since the onset of the pandemic, Dr. Mazet is frequently asked to speak about and consult on matters related to pandemics. She has been a strong advocate for mobilizing university networks in pandemic preparedness. [6] [7]

Under Mazet’s leadership, the Grand Challenges team at the University of California, Davis has established a transdisciplinary program in Emerging Health Threats to champion multisectoral engagement and emerging science and technological innovations across entities to better prepare for and even prevent the next pandemic. Toward this effort, and using the rich data derived from the PREDICT Project, Mazet has led the SpillOver project for viral risk ranking to estimate the likeliness of pathogen spillover between animals and humans. In collaboration with the [Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation (CEPI)], the UC Davis SpillOvers team has expanded the virus risk ranking using machine learning methods to identify virus families most likely to emerge as the next Disease X with pandemic potential. [8]


Prior to the Grand Challenges initiative, Mazet was Principal Investigator and Global Director of USAID’s PREDICT Project, which worked in more than 30 countries to build capacity to develop surveillance systems and complete the necessary research to halt the next pandemic, like influenza, SARS, Ebola, and HIV. [9] With these projects and others as a research foundation, she has served as the mentor for over 80 graduate student and postdoctoral trainees. She also co-authored the following recent publications: The discovery of Bombali virus adds further support for bats as hosts of ebolaviruses (Nature Microbiology) and The Global Virome Project (Science).

Honors and awards

2023 - American Veterinary Epidemiology Society’s K. F. Meyer/James H. Steele Gold-Headed Cane [10]

2021 Global Landscape Forum’s 16 Women Restoring the Earth [11]

2021 - 2021 AVMA Global Veterinary Service Award [12]

2020 - UC Davis Chancellor’s Award for International Engagement [13]

2020 - Global Aggie [14]

2018 - Shattuck Lecturer invited by the New England Journal of Medicine and the Massachusetts Medical Society [15]

2018 - TEDMED Hive Innovator for Global Virome Project (TEDMED speaker) [16]

2018 - Holbrook Lecturer, Children's National Health System [17]

2017 - Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) [18]

2017 - Honorable Mention, Remarkable Women of UC, University of California [19]

2017 - Inaugural Hall-Sewankambo Mid-Career Global Health Award, Consortium of Universities for Global Health [20]

2017 - Alumni Achievement Award, UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine

2016 - Leiter Lecturer, National Library of Medicine (NIH) and National Medical Library Association [21]

2016 - Schofield Metal, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph

2016 - Zoetis Award for Veterinary Research Excellence [22]

2015 - George C. Poppensiek Visiting Professor in Global Animal Health, Cornell University

2015 - American Veterinary Epidemiology Society Honorary Diplomate

2014 - R.G. Thomson Lecturer, Atlantic Veterinary College, University of Prince Edward Island (Canada)

2013 - Elected to the National Academy of Medicine (formerly Institute of Medicine)

2012 - Oscar W. Schalm Lecturer, University of California, Davis

2012 - Outstanding Alumna Award, University of California, Davis

2011 - International Wildlife Disease Association and American Association of Wildlife Veterinarians Joint Tom Thorne and Beth Williams Memorial Award – Most significant contribution to the field of wildlife health

2004 - Appointed to Governor of California’s Oil Spill Technical Advisory Committee

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of California, Davis</span> Public university in Davis, California

The University of California, Davis is a public land-grant research university in Davis, California, United States. It is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The institution was first founded as an agricultural branch of the system in 1905, known as the University Farm, and became the sixth campus of the University of California in 1959.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">UC Davis School of Medicine</span> Medical school of UC Davis

The University of California Davis School of Medicine is the medical school of the University of California, Davis. While the parent institution is located in Davis, California, the medical school is in Sacramento, California.

The University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine is the largest veterinary school in the United States. Established in 1948, the school is the primary health resource for California's animal populations. In 2020, the school was again ranked first in the United States by U.S. News & World Report and in 2022, ranked second in the world by QS World University Rankings. The school is located in the southwest corner of the main campus of the University of California, Davis. The current dean of veterinary medicine is Dr. Mark Stetter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">UC Davis Medical Center</span> Hospital in California, United States

UC Davis Medical Center (UCDMC) is part of UC Davis Health and a major academic health center located in Sacramento, California. It is owned and operated by the University of California as part of its University of California, Davis campus. The medical center sits on a 142-acre (57 ha) campus (often referred to as the Sacramento Campus to distinguish it from the main campus in nearby Davis) located between the Elmhurst, Tahoe Park, and Oak Park residential neighborhoods. The site incorporates the land and some of the buildings of the former Sacramento Medical Center (which was acquired from the County of Sacramento in 1973) as well as much of the land (and two buildings) previously occupied by the California State Fair until its 1967 move to a new location.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gary S. May</span> American academic & university chancellor

Gary Stephen May is a scholar, engineer, and the seventh chancellor of the University of California, Davis. From May 2005 to June 2011, he was the Steve W. Chaddick School Chair of the School of Electrical & Computer Engineering at Georgia Tech. He served as the Dean of the Georgia Tech College of Engineering from July 2011 until June 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">One Health</span> Collaborative global initiative

One Health is an approach calling for "the collaborative efforts of multiple disciplines working locally, nationally, and globally, to attain optimal health for people, animals and our environment", as defined by the One Health Initiative Task Force (OHITF). It developed in response to evidence of the spreading of zoonotic diseases between species and increasing awareness of "the interdependence of human and animal health and ecological change". In this viewpoint, public health is no longer seen in purely human terms. Due to a shared environment and highly conserved physiology, animals and humans not only suffer from the same zoonotic diseases but can also be treated by either structurally related or identical drugs. For this reason, special care must be taken to avoid unnecessary or over-treatment of zoonotic diseases, particularly in the context of drug resistance in infectious microbes.

Brenda McCowan is a research behaviorist interested in evolutionary, biological, and ecological aspects of animal behavior and communication. Her work focuses on improving the health and welfare of domesticated production animals, captive species, and wildlife using applied animal behavior and bioacoustics. She received her BS in Animal Physiology from Cornell University in 1985, and her PhD in Biological Anthropology from Harvard University in 1994. Dr. McCowan is the Program Head of Primate Behavioral Management at California National Primate Research Center, a position she has held since 2004. Dr. McCowan has been on the faculty at the University of California – Davis since 1999, and is currently an Associate Adjunct Professor in the Department of Population Health and Reproduction at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine. She also heads the McCowan Lab of Behavioral Management at UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, and is affiliated with the SETI Institute, Hubbs-Sea World Institute, and Santa Fe Institute.

Sarah Gray is a New Zealand rower.

The One Health Institute works at the interface of animals, people, plants, and the environment to solve complex problems that impact health and conservation around the world. The institute is part of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and is home to the Karen C. Drayer Wildlife Health Center and many other programs and projects. The executive director of the One Health Institute is Dr. Michael Ziccardi. The One Health approach recognizes that the health of domestic animals, wildlife, and people are inextricably linked to one another and the environment.

Susan Marie Stover is a professor of veterinary anatomy at the University of California, Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and director of the J.D. Wheat Veterinary Orthopedic Research Laboratory. One of the focuses of her wide-ranging research is musculoskeletal injuries in racehorses, particularly catastrophic breakdowns. Her identification of risk factors has resulted in improved early detection and changes to horse training and surgical repair methods. On July 30, 2016, Stover received the Lifetime Excellence in Research Award from the American Veterinary Medical Association. In August 2016, she was selected for induction into the University of Kentucky Equine Research Hall of Fame.

Predict was an epidemiological research program funded by a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) grant and led by UC Davis' One Health Institute. Launched in 2009, the program was described as an early warning pandemic system.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Daszak</span> British zoologist

Peter Daszak is a British zoologist, consultant and public expert on disease ecology, in particular on zoonosis. He is the president of EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit non-governmental organization that supports various programs on global health and pandemic prevention. He is also a member of the Center for Infection and Immunity at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. He lives in Suffern, New York.

The Global Virome Project (GVP) is an American-led international collaborative research initiative based at the One Health Institute at the University of California, Davis. The project was co-launched by EcoHealth Alliance president Peter Daszak, Nathan Wolfe and Edward Rubin of Metabiota, and former Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention director George F. Gao.

Sharon Y. Strauss is an American evolutionary ecologist. She is a Professor of Evolution and Ecology at the University of California, Davis.

Janet K. Yamamoto is an American immunologist. Yanamoto is a professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Florida where she studies the spread of HIV/AIDS. In 1988, she co-developed a vaccine for the feline version of HIV with Niels C. Pederson and was subsequently elected to the National Academy of Inventors.

Nancy E. Lane is an American rheumatologist. She is an Endowed Professor of Medicine, Rheumatology, and Aging Research at the University of California, Davis and director of the UC Davis Musculoskeletal Diseases of Aging Research Group. She has also sat on the editorial boards of Nature Reviews Rheumatology, Rheumatology,Seminars in Arthritis and Rheumatism,Arthritis & Rheumatology, and The Journal of Rheumatology. Her work on aging and glucocorticoids in cell populations is internationally recognized.

Allison Brashear is an American neurologist. As of October 2021, she has accepted a position as Vice President for Health Sciences and Dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University at Buffalo, New York. She was dean of the UC Davis School of Medicine until November 2021 and previously served as the Walter C. Teagle Endowed Chair of Neurology at Wake Forest School of Medicine.

Kathryn Gertrude Dewey is an American nutritionist. She is a Distinguished Professor Emerita in the Department of Nutrition at the University of California, Davis. Her studies in nutrition led to adaptations to the World Health Organization's recommendations for infants.

Christine Kreuder Johnson is an American epidemiologist and veterinary scientist who is Professor and Director of the EpiCenter for Disease Dynamics at the One Health Institute. She serves as Professor of Epidemiology and Ecosystem Health at the University of California, Davis. She was elected to the National Academy of Medicine and became a Fellow of the American Association for teh Advancement of Science in 2021 for her novel research to investigate the epidemiology of zoonotic infectious diseases using One Health approaches, illuminate key animal-human interfaces that facilitate transmission of infectious diseases, and identify synergies for environmental stewardship to protect animal and human health.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yu-Jui Yvonne Wan</span> Woman liver researcher

Yu-Jui Yvonne Wan is a Taiwanese medical academic. She researches Pathology at the University of California, Davis.

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