Tasmin Symons
Honorary Research Associate
tasmin.symons@thekids.org.au
Tasmin is Head of Model Development at the Malaria Atlas Project (Perth Node), leading the project’s research and development agenda. Tasmin and her team combine statistical and mathematical methods in geospatial analyses of malaria epidemiology, with a particular focus on P. falciparum in Africa. Tasmin's remit includes ongoing development of MAP’s intervention coverage and risk mapping model portfolios, as well as spin-off and stand-alone projects considering (among others) climate change impacts on malaria risk, malaria commodity need and optimal allocation, spatio-temporal trend attribution, and receptive transmission risk mapping.
Tasmin’s background is in pure mathematics, with her PhD (Imperial College London, 2020) focussing on the mathematical properties of spatio-temporal Gaussian processes with non-Euclidean (spherical) spatial domains. She is a Senior Research Fellow at Curtin University (School of Population Health), and Honorary Research Associate at The Kids Research Institute Australia, where she is based day-to-day in the Child Health Analytics Program.
Projects
Geospatial modelling for malaria risk stratification and intervention targeting for low-endemic countries
Geospatial modelling for malaria risk stratification and intervention targeting for high burden high impact countries
Published research
Fine-scale maps of malaria incidence to inform risk stratification in Laos
Malaria risk maps are crucial for controlling and eliminating malaria by identifying areas of varying transmission risk. In the Greater Mekong Subregion, these maps guide interventions and resource allocation. This article focuses on analysing changes in malaria transmission and developing fine-scale risk maps using five years of routine surveillance data in Laos (2017-2021). The study employed data from 1160 geolocated health facilities in Laos, along with high-resolution environmental data.
Impacts on Human Movement in Australian Cities Related to the COVID-19 Pandemic
No studies have yet examined high-resolution shifts in the spatial patterns of human movement in Australia throughout 2020 and 2021, a period coincident with the repeated enactment and removal of varied governmental restrictions aimed at reducing community transmission of SARS-CoV-2. We compared overlapping timeseries of COVID-19 pandemic-related restrictions, epidemiological data on cases and vaccination rates, and high-resolution human movement data to characterize population-level responses to the pandemic in Australian cities.
Gaussian random fields: with and without covariances
We begin with isotropic Gaussian random fields, and show how the Bochner-Godement theorem gives a natural way to describe their covariance structure. We continue with a study of Matérn processes on Euclidean space, spheres, manifolds and graphs, using Bessel potentials and stochastic partial differential equations (SPDEs).
Maps and metrics of insecticide-treated net access, use, and nets-per-capita in Africa from 2000-2020
Insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) are one of the most widespread and impactful malaria interventions in Africa, yet a spatially-resolved time series of ITN coverage has never been published. Using data from multiple sources, we generate high-resolution maps of ITN access, use, and nets-per-capita annually from 2000 to 2020 across the 40 highest-burden African countries.
Education and Qualifications
- PhD Imerial College London