Pardis Sabeti, M.D., D.Phil.

Pardis Sabeti is a core institute member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, a professor at the Center for Systems Biology and the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University, a professor in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Disease at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

The Sabeti Lab has pioneered genomic and computational technologies for detecting, tracking, and containing deadly pathogens, including Ebola, Zika, Lassa, SARS-CoV-2, and Plasmodium falciparum malaria. During the 2014 Ebola epidemic in West Africa, Sabeti’s team generated the first large-scale genomic dataset of a high-risk pathogen outbreak, led the field in making outbreak data available publicly in real-time, and showed that the Ebola virus was transmitting from human-to-human and mutating to do so more easily. During the COVID-19 pandemic, they led genomic investigations that elucidated the first superspreader events, variants of concern, and transmission from vaccinated individuals. 

Today, the lab integrates pathogen genomics, artificial intelligence, rapid diagnostics, and real-time outbreak intelligence to accelerate the detection and containment of emerging biological threats. This work is exemplified by the African Center of Excellence in Genomics of Infectious Disease (ACEGID), which Sabeti co-founded with Christian Happi in 2014, and Sentinel, the pandemic preemption system they launched in West Africa in 2020 with support from TED’s Audacious Project. Sentinel connects frontline surveillance with genomic and AI-enabled analytics and operational response systems, helping countries identify, characterize, and contain outbreaks before they escalate into regional or global crises. In 2025, Sentinel received a major grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation through its 100&Change competition. The lab has extended this framework in the United States to strengthen public health preparedness, national security, and defenses against emerging biological threats. In partnership with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, the Sabeti Lab co-leads the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-funded New England Pathogen Genomics Center of Excellence. 

The Sabeti lab combines computational genomics, experimental biology, and technology development to study fundamental biology and translate those insights into new approaches for improving human health. In human genetics, they have developed widely used algorithms and molecular tools to identify genetic and regulatory variation that shapes human health, disease, and history, as well as transformative methods for delivering new biomedicines to specific tissues in the body. In infectious disease, the lab characterizes pathogens and their interactions with human cells, identifies vulnerabilities that can be targeted, and develops countermeasures including diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines.

Sabeti is dedicated to training and capacity building. ACEGID and Sentinel have trained over 3,000 frontline scientists from 53 of 54 African countries. She serves as the CDC PGCoE’s educational content lead, and her lab has trained public health workforce across the U.S. She co-created Operation Outbreak, an outbreak prevention and preparedness curriculum and Bluetooth-based outbreak simulation already in 24 U.S. states and four countries. Sabeti has taught countless students at Harvard and online including through the Against All Odds statistics course and a Crash Course on outbreak science. 

Sabeti is a member of the National Academy of Science and National Academy of Medicine. Her honors include TIME magazine’s “Person of the Year” as one of the Ebola fighters, 100 Most Influential People, and Impact award. They also include World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, National Geographic Emerging Explorer, Smithsonian Magazine American Ingenuity Award for Natural Science, and NIH Innovator.

Sabeti is a co-founder of Delve Bio and Lyra Labs, and serves on the board of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.

Born in Tehran, Sabeti immigrated to the United States at the age of two. She completed her undergraduate degree in biology at MIT, her master’s and doctorate at the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, and her medical degree from Harvard Medical School summa cum laude as a Soros Fellow.