Harrington earned her PhD in Entomology from the University of Massachusetts -Amherst in 1999 and she completed postdoctoral training at the University of California Davis. Harrington joined the Cornell faculty in 2001 and was promoted to full professor in 2012. Her research program has been funded by NIH, NSF/NOAA and the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. Her work focuses broadly on the biology, ecology and behavior of disease vectors, global health and epidemiology. She has published extensively on the ecology of the dengue vector mosquito as well as other emerging vectors and disease systems such as West Nile virus. Her recent work focuses on the impact of climate change and globalization on emerging pathogens such as dengue and chikungunya viruses as well as the role of male seminal fluid proteins as targets for mosquito population control. Harrington teaches courses in medical entomology/epidemiology and global health as well as a non-majors course on the history of human disease and its impact on human culture entitled "Plagues and People