Thalia Sparling is an Assistant Professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, and the Co-Director of Research for the Agriculture, Nutrition and Health (ANH) Academy, an interdisciplinary community of practice with over 10,000 members worldwide.  She conducts research on causal pathways between food systems and nutrition/health, especially as these pathways relate to mental health, the environment and climate. She specialises in large-scale evidence (and methods) synthesis, path and decomposition analysis, and implementation research, including co-production. Thalia serves as the Evidence Synthesis Theme Lead for LSHTM's Centre for Evaluation.

Thalia is an integral member of the Nutrition for Global Health Master programme at LSHTM, and supervises DrPH and PhD candidates.  She has organised Master courses on Nutrition in Emergencies, and is the current Module Organiser for Nutrition-related Chronic Diseases.  She has developed and taught courses on decolonising global health and nutrition, as well as the sociopolitical history and landscape of nutrition and humanitarian intervention. She has been a Master Trainer on the ANH Academy’s intensive programme on interdisciplinary curriculum enrichment and teaching.

Thalia holds a PhD from the University of Heidelberg’s Institute of Public Health. Her dissertation examined the association of food access, diet and nutrition with depression in women, particularly in Bangladesh. Prior to this, she worked in South Sudan as a Technical Advisor to the South Sudan Guinea Worm Eradication Program with the Carter Center. Thalia holds an MPH from Columbia University’s Program on Forced Migration and Health, and a BA from Smith College in Anthropology.