Spencer J Fox
@foxandtheflu.bsky.social
Assistant prof at UGA in Epi/Bios, disease modeler, and data scientist. Posts are my own opinions
I'm glad someone did the work to lay this concept out so nicely! Predicting the size of an influenza season is not as easy as seeing a new variant and extrapolating trends. This may be a bad flu season, but it's way too soon to tell! christinapagel.substack.com/p/is-it-real...
Is it really a super flu year?
We're in the middle of a serious flu wave, but we just can't tell yet how bad it's going to be. Week-on-week comparisons are being used in a misleading way!
christinapagel.substack.com
December 11, 2025 at 11:14 PM
I'm glad someone did the work to lay this concept out so nicely! Predicting the size of an influenza season is not as easy as seeing a new variant and extrapolating trends. This may be a bad flu season, but it's way too soon to tell! christinapagel.substack.com/p/is-it-real...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Become a colleague in my department!
Applications close in four days, December 15.
Applications close in four days, December 15.
My department at UT Austin is looking to hire an Assistant Professor in Evolutionary Biology, broadly defined. Feel free to reach out to me with any questions you may have.
apply.interfolio.com/177547
apply.interfolio.com/177547
Apply - Interfolio
{{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio
apply.interfolio.com
December 11, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Become a colleague in my department!
Applications close in four days, December 15.
Applications close in four days, December 15.
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
UF Biology is searching for an Asst Prof in Evolution, Ecology of Infectious Disease - spread the word! @ufresearch.bsky.social @ufgeog.bsky.social @sse-evolution.bsky.social
explore.jobs.ufl.edu/en-us/job/53...
explore.jobs.ufl.edu/en-us/job/53...
University of Florida - Details - Assistant Professor in Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease
explore.jobs.ufl.edu
December 10, 2025 at 5:04 PM
UF Biology is searching for an Asst Prof in Evolution, Ecology of Infectious Disease - spread the word! @ufresearch.bsky.social @ufgeog.bsky.social @sse-evolution.bsky.social
explore.jobs.ufl.edu/en-us/job/53...
explore.jobs.ufl.edu/en-us/job/53...
Most of the Fox lab got to experience ~7000ft of elevation change going from #Epidemics10 in San Diego to Flagstaff, AZ for a writing retreat. Here we are on our celebratory visit to the Grand Canyon afterwards!
December 10, 2025 at 4:21 PM
Most of the Fox lab got to experience ~7000ft of elevation change going from #Epidemics10 in San Diego to Flagstaff, AZ for a writing retreat. Here we are on our celebratory visit to the Grand Canyon afterwards!
Considering going to the International Symposium on Forecasting (isf.forecasters.org/overview/abo...) in Montreal this summer - has anyone been before or have recommendations of whether it's useful/informative for disease forecasters?
About the ISF - International Symposium on Forecasting
The International Symposium on Forecasting, presented by the International Institute of Forecasters (IIF), is the premier international event for professional
isf.forecasters.org
December 10, 2025 at 4:17 PM
Considering going to the International Symposium on Forecasting (isf.forecasters.org/overview/abo...) in Montreal this summer - has anyone been before or have recommendations of whether it's useful/informative for disease forecasters?
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
The MIDAS Trainee Executive Committee is recruiting new members for 2026! 🤓
This is a great opportunity for grad students & postdocs in infectious disease modeling to gain experience organizing events & connect with peers.
Applications are due by 9am ET on 1/1/2026, link in flyer & alt text.
This is a great opportunity for grad students & postdocs in infectious disease modeling to gain experience organizing events & connect with peers.
Applications are due by 9am ET on 1/1/2026, link in flyer & alt text.
December 8, 2025 at 7:50 PM
The MIDAS Trainee Executive Committee is recruiting new members for 2026! 🤓
This is a great opportunity for grad students & postdocs in infectious disease modeling to gain experience organizing events & connect with peers.
Applications are due by 9am ET on 1/1/2026, link in flyer & alt text.
This is a great opportunity for grad students & postdocs in infectious disease modeling to gain experience organizing events & connect with peers.
Applications are due by 9am ET on 1/1/2026, link in flyer & alt text.
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Precisely so, I look forward to convening a Wed AM panel on "Confronting Covid's Wake."
We will explore the link between COVID responses, anti-science, and misinformation… and how & why to support evidence-based inquiry to confront disease threats.
virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/event/public...
We will explore the link between COVID responses, anti-science, and misinformation… and how & why to support evidence-based inquiry to confront disease threats.
virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/event/public...
OA Virtual conferences
virtual.oxfordabstracts.com
December 3, 2025 at 12:50 AM
Precisely so, I look forward to convening a Wed AM panel on "Confronting Covid's Wake."
We will explore the link between COVID responses, anti-science, and misinformation… and how & why to support evidence-based inquiry to confront disease threats.
virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/event/public...
We will explore the link between COVID responses, anti-science, and misinformation… and how & why to support evidence-based inquiry to confront disease threats.
virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/event/public...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Federal government and Utah leaders are having a meeting this week to discuss co-management of national parks in Utah, setting a dangerous precedent for national parks across the nation.
Read more: www.thetravel.com/us-governmen...
Read more: www.thetravel.com/us-governmen...
U.S. Government Eyes Utah National Parks For “Dangerous” Plan That Could Spread To Parks Across The Country
The alleged meeting fears the public and environmentalists it might involve the Mighty Five.
www.thetravel.com
December 1, 2025 at 10:43 PM
Federal government and Utah leaders are having a meeting this week to discuss co-management of national parks in Utah, setting a dangerous precedent for national parks across the nation.
Read more: www.thetravel.com/us-governmen...
Read more: www.thetravel.com/us-governmen...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
A challenge in epidemic forecasting is that ML models overfit while mechanistic models miss changing transmission conditions. Our new JR Soc Interface paper tests whether physics-informed neural networks—which embed an epidemiological ODE system inside a neural net—can address this.
December 1, 2025 at 12:31 PM
A challenge in epidemic forecasting is that ML models overfit while mechanistic models miss changing transmission conditions. Our new JR Soc Interface paper tests whether physics-informed neural networks—which embed an epidemiological ODE system inside a neural net—can address this.
ID folks, come find me at the poster session tonight (2.041) or dm me if you’re looking for a postdoctoral position and want to hear more about our work/group. #Epidemics10
A new postdoc position just opened in our group at NAU! We are looking for someone to lead our current forecasting activities and the development of our next generation AI/ML models! Don't hesitate to reach out to me with any questions! careers.nau.edu/jobs/postdoc...
Postdoctoral Scholar - Flagstaff, Arizona, United States
Special Information
This position is an on-site position which requires the incumbent to complete their work primarily at an NAU site, campus, or facility with or without accommodation. Opportunities...
careers.nau.edu
December 1, 2025 at 11:28 PM
ID folks, come find me at the poster session tonight (2.041) or dm me if you’re looking for a postdoctoral position and want to hear more about our work/group. #Epidemics10
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Brilliant and inspiring talk by Shweta Bansal @bansallab.bsky.social at #Epidemics10 on contact patterns at the interface of data, modelling and public health — and even across species!
December 1, 2025 at 8:16 PM
Brilliant and inspiring talk by Shweta Bansal @bansallab.bsky.social at #Epidemics10 on contact patterns at the interface of data, modelling and public health — and even across species!
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Good news! The Ebola outbreak in DRC has been contained
December 1, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Good news! The Ebola outbreak in DRC has been contained
@bansallab.bsky.social gives a tour de force of behavioral models and theory as a keynote at #epidemics10. How COVID-19 and animal behavior have helped improve our understanding of human behaviors and disease dynamics
December 1, 2025 at 6:37 PM
@bansallab.bsky.social gives a tour de force of behavioral models and theory as a keynote at #epidemics10. How COVID-19 and animal behavior have helped improve our understanding of human behaviors and disease dynamics
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
We’ve just released Epistorm-Mix, a new open dataset on how people in the U.S. mix across ages and settings in the post-COVID era.
📊 Contact-level data + contact matrices
Built for epidemic modeling & forecasting
Fully open data & code
🔗 www.epistorm.org/data/epistor...
📊 Contact-level data + contact matrices
Built for epidemic modeling & forecasting
Fully open data & code
🔗 www.epistorm.org/data/epistor...
Epistorm-Mix: Mapping Social Contact Patterns in the Post-Pandemic United States
Epistorm-Mix provides individual-level contact data and contacts patterns characterization relevant for the spread of respiratory infectious diseases within the US population.
www.epistorm.org
November 25, 2025 at 3:11 PM
We’ve just released Epistorm-Mix, a new open dataset on how people in the U.S. mix across ages and settings in the post-COVID era.
📊 Contact-level data + contact matrices
Built for epidemic modeling & forecasting
Fully open data & code
🔗 www.epistorm.org/data/epistor...
📊 Contact-level data + contact matrices
Built for epidemic modeling & forecasting
Fully open data & code
🔗 www.epistorm.org/data/epistor...
This is only a few hours from Flagstaff, check out our open postdoctoral position if you're interested in being this close to these magical places: careers.nau.edu/jobs/postdoc...
November 25, 2025 at 1:21 AM
This is only a few hours from Flagstaff, check out our open postdoctoral position if you're interested in being this close to these magical places: careers.nau.edu/jobs/postdoc...
I for one am here for the 6 month predictions on measles cases that you can find on Kalshi. July 8th the average prediction was about 1.7k cases for the whole year and we are heading towards about 2k by my rough estimate. kalshi.com/markets/kxme...
Measles cases this year? | Trade on Kalshi
Track what Kalshi's markets predict for "Measles cases this year?", or trade it yourself.
kalshi.com
November 18, 2025 at 10:06 PM
I for one am here for the 6 month predictions on measles cases that you can find on Kalshi. July 8th the average prediction was about 1.7k cases for the whole year and we are heading towards about 2k by my rough estimate. kalshi.com/markets/kxme...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Postdoc (Flagstaff or remote, USA)
Lead the Fox Lab's outbreak forecasting efforts in collaboration with domestic and international public health partners.
with @foxandtheflu.bsky.social
at Northern Arizona University
More details: http://iddjobs.org/jobs/2409
Lead the Fox Lab's outbreak forecasting efforts in collaboration with domestic and international public health partners.
with @foxandtheflu.bsky.social
at Northern Arizona University
More details: http://iddjobs.org/jobs/2409
November 14, 2025 at 9:14 PM
Postdoc (Flagstaff or remote, USA)
Lead the Fox Lab's outbreak forecasting efforts in collaboration with domestic and international public health partners.
with @foxandtheflu.bsky.social
at Northern Arizona University
More details: http://iddjobs.org/jobs/2409
Lead the Fox Lab's outbreak forecasting efforts in collaboration with domestic and international public health partners.
with @foxandtheflu.bsky.social
at Northern Arizona University
More details: http://iddjobs.org/jobs/2409
Just finished writing up a quick summary of our new publication on the lab website. We developed a new method we call "epimodulation" that fixes biases in forecasts with epidemiological principles. It was really fun to work on this one! thefoxlab.wordpress.com/2025/11/12/n...
New paper – Improving outbreak forecasts through model augmentation
The Fox lab had our latest forecasting work published in PNAS a couple of weeks ago! This paper has been about 4 years in the making beginning a couple of years in to the COVID-19 pandemic when our…
thefoxlab.wordpress.com
November 12, 2025 at 10:24 PM
Just finished writing up a quick summary of our new publication on the lab website. We developed a new method we call "epimodulation" that fixes biases in forecasts with epidemiological principles. It was really fun to work on this one! thefoxlab.wordpress.com/2025/11/12/n...
In the NYT today, a discussion of how Canada will lose their measles elimination status. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/06/w...
This was predictable and preventable, something Amy Winter and I discussed in our disease watch piece 4 months ago: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was predictable and preventable, something Amy Winter and I discussed in our disease watch piece 4 months ago: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Canada Is About to Lose Its Status as Having Eliminated Measles
www.nytimes.com
November 6, 2025 at 3:32 PM
In the NYT today, a discussion of how Canada will lose their measles elimination status. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/06/w...
This was predictable and preventable, something Amy Winter and I discussed in our disease watch piece 4 months ago: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was predictable and preventable, something Amy Winter and I discussed in our disease watch piece 4 months ago: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Multi-model approach to understand and predict past and future dengue epidemic dynamics
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Brilliant work by @cathalmills.bsky.social + many others
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Brilliant work by @cathalmills.bsky.social + many others
November 5, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Multi-model approach to understand and predict past and future dengue epidemic dynamics
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Brilliant work by @cathalmills.bsky.social + many others
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Brilliant work by @cathalmills.bsky.social + many others
A new postdoc position just opened in our group at NAU! We are looking for someone to lead our current forecasting activities and the development of our next generation AI/ML models! Don't hesitate to reach out to me with any questions! careers.nau.edu/jobs/postdoc...
Postdoctoral Scholar - Flagstaff, Arizona, United States
Special Information
This position is an on-site position which requires the incumbent to complete their work primarily at an NAU site, campus, or facility with or without accommodation. Opportunities...
careers.nau.edu
November 4, 2025 at 9:46 PM
A new postdoc position just opened in our group at NAU! We are looking for someone to lead our current forecasting activities and the development of our next generation AI/ML models! Don't hesitate to reach out to me with any questions! careers.nau.edu/jobs/postdoc...
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
Check out our new paper @nejm.org. RSV, COVID-19 & Influenza vaccines continue to show consistent effectiveness & safety based on a review & synthesis of 500+ research studies👇! We worked hard to evaluate the evidence so you can be confident about getting vaccinated this fall!
Even as the anti-vax lobby erodes public trust, new evidence confirms that "immunizations against Covid-19, RSV, and influenza have shown consistent effectiveness & safety and are associated with a substantially reduced risk of hospitalization & severe disease"
www.nejm.org/doi/full/10....
www.nejm.org/doi/full/10....
October 31, 2025 at 2:54 PM
Check out our new paper @nejm.org. RSV, COVID-19 & Influenza vaccines continue to show consistent effectiveness & safety based on a review & synthesis of 500+ research studies👇! We worked hard to evaluate the evidence so you can be confident about getting vaccinated this fall!
Reposted by Spencer J Fox
1/5: Interested in basketball? Disease ecology? Epidemics?
5 years ago, the NBA embarked on a great experiment in infection control: "The NBA Bubble." In a new preprint led by Dr. Yun Tao + Dr. Nita Bharti, we examine it's underlying disease ecology principles.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
5 years ago, the NBA embarked on a great experiment in infection control: "The NBA Bubble." In a new preprint led by Dr. Yun Tao + Dr. Nita Bharti, we examine it's underlying disease ecology principles.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
Pandemic-era sports league operations as a new paradigm for local epidemic resilience
Strategic, coordinated, and rapid responses are essential when pathogens emerge, yet these responses are often mishandled during epidemics due to myriad factors, including entrenched socioeconomic and...
www.medrxiv.org
October 31, 2025 at 11:56 AM
1/5: Interested in basketball? Disease ecology? Epidemics?
5 years ago, the NBA embarked on a great experiment in infection control: "The NBA Bubble." In a new preprint led by Dr. Yun Tao + Dr. Nita Bharti, we examine it's underlying disease ecology principles.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
5 years ago, the NBA embarked on a great experiment in infection control: "The NBA Bubble." In a new preprint led by Dr. Yun Tao + Dr. Nita Bharti, we examine it's underlying disease ecology principles.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
Took some time to update the lab website with a couple new posts and lab news! Check it out to hear about some lab changes and recent fun things we've been up to! thefoxlab.wordpress.com
The Fox Lab
Statistical and computational epidemiology
thefoxlab.wordpress.com
October 29, 2025 at 8:27 PM
Took some time to update the lab website with a couple new posts and lab news! Check it out to hear about some lab changes and recent fun things we've been up to! thefoxlab.wordpress.com
Just published! Our new work on a method to add epi info to any forecast model. We showed that it improved the performance of all forecast models we tested including ensembles. Now we hope to deploy it in real-time to see how well it works: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
www.pnas.org
October 27, 2025 at 5:58 PM
Just published! Our new work on a method to add epi info to any forecast model. We showed that it improved the performance of all forecast models we tested including ensembles. Now we hope to deploy it in real-time to see how well it works: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...