Lyle R. Petersen, MD, MPH

Director, Division of Vector-Borne Diseases,
National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID)

Lyle R. Petersen, MD, MPH, is the director of the Division of Vector-Borne Diseases in the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID). The division, located in Fort Collins, Colorado, supports CDC’s mission to protect the American public from exotic and domestic bacterial and viral pathogens transmitted by mosquitoes, ticks, fleas, and other vectors.

Dr. Petersen earned his medical degree from the University of California, San Francisco. His career at CDC began in the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) in 1985. After his EIS training, he joined CDC’s Division of HIV/AIDS where he worked until 1995. During that time, he completed CDC’s Preventive Medicine Residency Program, received a Master of Public Health degree from Emory University, and served in several posts, including the Chief of the HIV Seroepidemiology Branch. In 1996, Dr. Petersen accepted an assignment in Germany where he helped guide that country’s efforts in creating a new national infectious disease epidemiology program at the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin. In 2000 he returned to the United States to serve as the Deputy Director for Science of the Division of Vector-Borne Diseases, and he became the division’s Director in 2004.