Nita Bharti

Huck Early Career Professor; Associate Professor of Biology

Nita Bharti

Research Summary

The Bharti lab investigates the underlying links between humans, pathogens, and the environment. We work to identify the mechanisms that give rise to heterogeneities in host disease burden and risk across scales, across spatial and temporal scales. We study the dynamics of host-environment interactions that drive movement and contact patterns as they relate to to pathogen transmission and access to health care.

Huck Graduate Students

Huck Affiliations

Links

Most Recent Publications

Impact of a multi-pronged cholera intervention in an endemic setting

Alexandre Blake, Adam Walder, Ephraim M. Hanks, Placide Okitayemba Welo, Francisco Luquero, Didier Bompangue, Nita Bharti, 2025, PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases

Anthropogenic land consolidation intensifies zoonotic host diversity loss and disease transmission in human habitats

Shan Pei, Pengbo Yu, Jayna Raghwani, Yuxin Wang, Ziyan Liu, Yidan Li, Yanchao Cheng, Qiushi Lin, Chuliang Song, Guha Dharmarajan, Christina L. Faust, Yunyu Tian, Yiting Xu, Yilin Liang, Jianhui Qu, Jing Wei, Shen Li, Tongjun Zhang, Chaofeng Ma, Nita Bharti, Bernard Cazelles, Ruifu Yang, Oliver G. Pybus, Andrew P. Dobson, Nils Chr Stenseth, Huaiyu Tian, 2024, Nature Ecology and Evolution

Native and non-native winter foraging resources do not explain Pteropus alecto winter roost occupancy in Queensland, Australia

Kelsee Baranowski, Nita Bharti, 2024, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

Human movement and transmission dynamics early in Ebola outbreaks

Alexandria Gonzalez, Behnam Nikparvar, M Matson, Stephanie Seifert, H Ross, Vinent Munster, Nita Bharti, 2023, medRxiv on p. 2023--12

Disparities in mobile phone ownership reflect inequities in access to healthcare

Alexandre Blake, Ashley Hazel, John Jakurama, Justy Matundu, Nita Bharti, 2023, PLOS Digital Health

Environmental variation across multiple spatial scales and temporal lags influences Hendra virus spillover

Christina L. Faust, Adrian A. Castellanos, Alison J. Peel, Peggy Eby, Raina K. Plowright, Barbara A. Han, Nita Bharti, 2023, Journal of Applied Ecology on p. 1457-1467

Habitat loss for black flying foxes and implications for Hendra virus

Kelsee Baranowski, Nita Bharti, 2023, Landscape Ecology on p. 1605-1618

Large university with high COVID-19 incidence is not associated with excess cases in non-student population

Nita Bharti, Brian Lambert, Cara Exten, Christina Faust, Matthew Ferrari, Anthony Robinson, 2022, Scientific Reports

Assessing the asymptomatic proportion of SARS-CoV-2 infection with age in China before mass vaccination

Zengmiao Wang, Peiyi Wu, Jingyuan Wang, José Lourenço, Bingying Li, Benjamin Rader, Marko Laine, Hui Miao, Ligui Wang, Hongbin Song, Nita Bharti, John S. Brownstein, Ottar N. Bjornstad, Christopher Dye, Huaiyu Tian, 2022, Journal of the Royal Society Interface

Author Correction: Ecology, evolution and spillover of coronaviruses from bats (Nature Reviews Microbiology, (2022), 20, 5, (299-314), 10.1038/s41579-021-00652-2)

Manuel Ruiz-Aravena, Clifton McKee, Amandine Gamble, Tamika Lunn, Aaron Morris, Celine E. Snedden, Claude Kwe Yinda, Julia R. Port, David W. Buchholz, Yao Yu Yeo, Christina Faust, Elinor Jax, Lauren Dee, Devin N. Jones, Maureen K. Kessler, Caylee Falvo, Daniel Crowley, Nita Bharti, Cara E. Brook, Hector C. Aguilar, Alison J. Peel, Olivier Restif, Tony Schountz, Colin R. Parrish, Emily S. Gurley, James O. Lloyd-Smith, Peter J. Hudson, Vincent J. Munster, Raina K. Plowright, 2022, Nature Reviews Microbiology on p. 315

Most-Cited Papers

Ecology, evolution and spillover of coronaviruses from bats

Manuel Ruiz-Aravena, Clifton McKee, Amandine Gamble, Tamika Lunn, Aaron Morris, Celine E. Snedden, Claude Kwe Yinda, Julia R. Port, David Buchholz, Yao Yu Yeo, Christina Faust, Elinor Jax, Lauren Dee, Devin N. Jones, Maureen K. Kessler, Caylee Falvo, Daniel Crowley, Nita Bharti, Cara E. Brook, Hector C. Aguilar, Alison J. Peel, Olivier Restif, Tony Schountz, Colin R. Parrish, Emily S. Gurley, James O. Lloyd-Smith, Peter J. Hudson, Vincent J. Munster, Raina K. Plowright, 2021, Nature Reviews Microbiology on p. 299-314

The influence of vector-borne disease on human history: socio-ecological mechanisms

Tejas S. Athni, Marta S. Shocket, Lisa I. Couper, Nicole Nova, Iain R. Caldwell, Jamie M. Caldwell, Jasmine N. Childress, Marissa L. Childs, Giulio A. De Leo, Devin G. Kirk, Andrew J. MacDonald, Kathryn Olivarius, David G. Pickel, Steven O. Roberts, Olivia C. Winokur, Hillary S. Young, Julian Cheng, Elizabeth A. Grant, Patrick M. Kurzner, Saw Kyaw, Bradford J. Lin, Ricardo C. Lopez, Diba S. Massihpour, Erica C. Olsen, Maggie Roache, Angie Ruiz, Emily A. Schultz, Muskan Shafat, Rebecca L. Spencer, Nita Bharti, Erin A. Mordecai, 2021, Ecology Letters on p. 829-846

Measuring populations to improve vaccination coverage

Nita Bharti, Ali Djibo, Andrew J. Tatem, Bryan T. Grenfell, Matthew J. Ferrari, 2016, Scientific Reports

Remotely measuring populations during a crisis by overlaying two data sources

Nita Bharti, Xin Lu, Linus Bengtsson, Erik Wetter, Andrew J. Tatem, 2015, International Health on p. 90-98

Fluctuations in anthropogenic nighttime lights from satellite imagery for five cities in Niger and Nigeria

Nita Bharti, Andrew J. Tatem, 2018, Scientific data

Linking human behaviors and infectious diseases

Nita Bharti, 2021, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Transient disease dynamics across ecological scales

Yun Tao, Jessica L. Hite, Kevin D. Lafferty, David J.D. Earn, Nita Bharti, 2021, Theoretical Ecology on p. 625-640

Quantifying the impacts of Australian bushfires on native forests and gray-headed flying foxes

K. Baranowski, C. L. Faust, P. Eby, N. Bharti, 2021, Global Ecology and Conservation

Large university with high COVID-19 incidence is not associated with excess cases in non-student population

Nita Bharti, Brian Lambert, Cara Exten, Christina Faust, Matthew Ferrari, Anthony Robinson, 2022, Scientific Reports

Opportunities and constraints in women's resource security amid climate change: A case study of arid-living Namibian agro-pastoralists

Ashley Hazel, Gillian Meeks, Nita Bharti, John Jakurama, Justy Matundu, James Holland Jones, 2021, American Journal of Human Biology

News Articles Featuring Nita Bharti

Apr 18, 2025

Focus on sanitation and clean water may improve control of endemic cholera

Pathogens that persist in hosts and environments may require tailored management strategies, according to new study of endemic cholera interventions in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Full Article

Jul 06, 2023

Mobile phone data used for public health underrepresent vulnerable populations

Mobile phone data are increasingly used in public health management and disease outbreak response, as demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic when location data were used as a proxy for human movement and contacts.

Full Article

Jun 12, 2023

Penn State announces tenure-line faculty promotions, effective July 1, 2023

The following is a list of academic promotions for tenured and tenure-line faculty members at Penn State, effective July 1, 2023.

Full Article

Aug 31, 2022

Penn State team awarded $2.3M to assess disease vulnerability, improve response

An interdisciplinary team from Penn State has been awarded $2.3M from the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation’s joint Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease (EEID) program to evaluate the vulnerability of certain populations to disease outbreaks, with the goal of improving outbreak response and preventing future outbreaks.

Full Article

Jan 27, 2022

Nita Bharti to deliver 2022 Darwin Day Lecture

Nita Bharti, Penn State assistant professor of biology, will deliver a virtual lecture titled “Adaptation for Survival: Humans and Their Pathogens” at 4 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 10, as part of Penn State’s 2022 Darwin Day celebration. Advance registration is required for the event, which is open to the public.

Full Article

Jan 11, 2022

Researchers use satellites to monitor bat habitat and study virus spillover

Over the last year and a half, the word "remote" has come to dominate a large portion of our collective consciousness. We’ve had to work remotely, learn remotely, and even socialize remotely. But before the pandemic, because of the nature of their research, remote was already a part of the daily lexicon of some Penn State researchers.

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Dec 20, 2021

Sports Leagues Are Showing Us Just How Bad Omicron Could Get

Even some of the healthiest and most highly vaccinated communities in the country are being ravaged by the new variant.

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Oct 25, 2021

Traffic and mobile phone data predict COVID case counts in rural Pennsylvania

How much people moved around town predicted COVID-19 cases in a rural Pennsylvania county in 2020, according to a new study by researchers at Penn State.

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Jul 15, 2021

Australian megafires burn critical habitat of 'Vulnerable' virus-harboring bats

The severe megafires that occurred in eastern Australia during 2019-20 were much larger and more concentrated across the landscape than in previous years, according to a study by researchers at Penn State and the University of New South Wales. The unprecedented fires included the burning of 34% of the foraging habitat of grey-headed flying foxes, which are known to transmit deadly Lyssa and Hendra viruses.

Full Article

Jun 23, 2021

Behavior limits COVID-19 spread between University and community

When universities across the U.S. opted to return students to campus for in-person learning during the coronavirus pandemic in the fall of 2020, surrounding communities were understandably concerned that COVID-19 infections rates would significantly increase. In response, several Penn State researchers formed the Centre County COVID-19 Data 4 Action Project (D4A) to conduct anonymous surveys and biological testing for nonstudent residents and Penn State students to document the social and economic impacts of the pandemic in one community.

Full Article

Feb 02, 2021

Vector-borne diseases shaped human history and reveal race disparities

Vector-borne diseases (VBDs), such as plague, malaria and yellow fever, have significantly shaped society and culture, according to an international team of researchers. In a study published in Ecology Letters on Jan. 27, the team used historical evidence interpreted through an ecological lens to illustrate how VBDs have influenced human history, with particular attention to how VBDs have reinforced and exacerbated racism.

Full Article

Jan 29, 2021

Take Note: Epidemiologist Dr. Nita Bharti On Safety And Effectiveness Of New COVID-19 Vaccines

The COVID-19 vaccine is slowly rolling out across the country. Some people still have concerns about these new vaccines and their safety.

Full Article

Dec 21, 2020

Can the NBA win its rematch with COVID-19?

As the pandemic wreaks havoc on the NCAA and NFL, the 2020-21 NBA season offers new hopes and fears

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Oct 30, 2020

Football is back in Happy Valley. The Coronavirus never left.

Not quite a mile form Beaver Stadium, there's an off-the-grid building encircled by a tall metal fence. Surrounded by fields, unmarked on maps, it looks like a tiny jail north of the Penn State campus. The gate is locked.

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Oct 16, 2020

Heading down to the Linc Sunday for the Ravens-Eagles game? Here’s what you need to know

So you’re an Eagles season ticket holder who opted in for 2020, instead of deferring for a year, and then you secured a “pod” of two to six tickets to Sunday’s game against the Baltimore Ravens — the first game this season in which fans will be allowed at Lincoln Financial Field. What can you expect?

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Sep 09, 2020

The NFL expects to play a full season despite coronavirus concerns

Training camp amid the pandemic went better than even some of the most optimistic NFL observers would have predicted, with the league’s COVID-19 reserve list dwindling steadily from 66 players at the end of July to fewer than half a dozen as the week of the season openers arrived.

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Aug 25, 2020

Measles outbreaks in Niger linked to rainfall and temperature, study finds

Rainfall and temperature drive agricultural activity, which, in turn, influences patterns of measles outbreaks in the West African nation of Niger, according to an international team of researchers. The findings may be useful for improving vaccine coverage for seasonally mobile populations within Niger and other countries.

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Aug 25, 2020

Faculty funded to study how people's movement impacts COVID-19 transmission

Nita Bharti, Lloyd Huck Early Career Professor and assistant professor of biology at Penn State, and her collaborator Anthony Robinson, associate professor of geography at Penn State, have been awarded seed funding from the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences at Penn State to study how monitoring the movement of people can potentially be used as a predictor or early indicator of COVID-19 transmission and guide health policy decisions.

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Jul 26, 2020

Penn State is about to turn Centre County into a massive coronavirus research project

Tens of thousands of students are scheduled to return to Penn State’s main campus in central Pennsylvania next month, swelling its host county’s population by more than a third. And during a historic public health crisis, that’s a research opportunity.

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Jul 14, 2020

Huck Institutes tackles pandemic with true 'We Are' spirit

For faculty, staff and administrators working across Penn State’s Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts is more than an abstraction. It’s an everyday reality.

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Jul 08, 2020

Researchers gauge the effect of protests and reopenings on reviving the pandemic

Epidemiologists say the crowding conditions associated with mass protests over police violence seem likely to add dozens of people, or perhaps even hundreds, to the daily death toll from coronavirus infections. But they acknowledge that these sorts of assessments involve a tradeoff between public health and social justice.

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Jul 01, 2020

Politicians, scientists back masks: They work

Political leaders are increasingly embracing recommendations from scientists and public health experts that face masks can drastically slow transmission of the coronavirus, even as many right-wing commentators scorn their use.

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Jun 20, 2020

Young people drive new coronavirus spikes

The rising number of COVID-19 cases in states across the country is due in large part to more young people contracting the virus, raising alarms among public health officials.

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May 27, 2020

US tops 100,000 coronavirus deaths with no end in sight

More than 100,000 Americans have died from the coronavirus, a staggering wave of death that has brought the world's largest economy to its knees as the federal government struggles even now to mount a concerted nationwide response.

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May 15, 2020

COVID-19 now spreading fastest in small, rural counties

The coronavirus pandemic is spreading out from urban centers and increasingly infecting residents in small rural counties, even as some of those areas begin to loosen lockdown requirements aimed at stopping its spread.

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