Hans Heesterbeek

J A P (Hans) Heesterbeek has been a professor of theoretical epidemiology at Utrecht University since 2001. He has a broad research interest on the interface between biology/medicine and mathematics. His focus is on the dynamics of infectious disease, currently in particular on the interaction between (wildlife) ecology and (human disease) epidemiology, with an overall emphasis on the development and use of mathematical tools to generate relevant biological and public health insight. Recently, he also became interested in using insight and methods from theoretical ecology and infectious disease dynamics to study emerging phenomena in a broad range of complex (social, societal and financial) systems.

In addition, he has an active interest in the history of science and is currently working on a book on the history of the study of epidemics. He was one of the founders of the journal Epidemics and one of its two Editors-in-Chief in the period 2008-2019.