Jonathan Patz, MD, MPH, is Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor & John P. Holton Chair of Health and the Environment and, from 2011-2022, served as inaugural director of the Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His faculty appointments are in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and the Department of Population Health Sciences.  Dr. Patz co-chaired the health report for the first Congressionally mandated US National Assessment on Climate Change and for 15 years, served as a lead author for the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – the organization that shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.  Some of his other awards include: the Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellows Award; shared Zayed International Prize for the Environment; Fulbright Scholarship; American Public Health Association’s Homer Calver Award for environmental health leadership; Case Western School of Medicine Alumni Special Recognition award; Johns Hopkins Society of Scholars; Chanchlani Global Health Research Award; and elected member of the National Academy of Medicine.

Professor Patz has taught and conducted research on the health effects of climate change and global environmental change for nearly 30 years, and currently directs the university's Planetary Health Scholars Program.  He has published over 200 science publications and several textbooks on these subjects.