Mark Smolinski

Mark Smolinski is the Director of Global Health Threats and the Chief Medical Officer at the Skoll Global Threats Fund. One of the founding directors at SGTF, Mark leads the Pandemics Team in its efforts to End Pandemics in our Lifetime.

Mark’s current work is bringing innovative ideas to apply technology to find, verify and report outbreaks faster. He is leading efforts across the globe to put the public in public health through participatory surveillance. Mark has helped bring technologists and human and animal health experts together to co-create tools in Albania, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Tanzania, and Thailand in the past few years to help each country create their own solutions to pressing local needs.

Previously, Mark served as the Director of the Predict and Prevent Initiative at Google.org, when it was only a start-up organization. While at Google.org, Mark worked with a team of engineers to create Google Flu Trends, a project that had tremendous impact on the use of “big data” for disease surveillance. In 2009, he was stationed by Google.org in Cambodia to assist the countries of Southeast Asia dealing with highly pathogenic avian influenza.

Before joining Google.org, Mark was the Vice President for Biological Programs at the Nuclear Threat Initiative where he led the development of a regional disease surveillance system linking Israel, Jordan, and Palestine, demonstrating the power of health as a diplomatic tool even in areas of longstanding conflict. Additionally, Mark was listed as one of WIRED Magazine’s 2008 Smart List of ‘15 People the Next President Should Listen To.’

Mark graduated magna cum laude with a B.S. in Biology and, later, with an M.D. from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and holds an M.P.H. from the University of Arizona, where he was recognized as the 2016 Alumnus of the Year.