Biography
Adrian Liston is Professor of Pathology at Department of Pathology. Liston trained at Adelaide University before a PhD at the Australian National University, and a post-doc at the University of Washington, with additional degrees in Higher Education and Public Health. Liston started his career as an independent researcher at the VIB and University of Leuven in Belgium, where he ran a lab with Dr James Dooley for 10 years (2009-2018) before moving the lab to the Babraham Institute in 2019. Between 2019 and 2023, the Liston-Dooley lab worked on biotechnology developments in neuroinflammation, developing new therapeutic approaches and setting up a spin-off company Aila Biotech Ltd. In 2023, the Liston-Dooley laboratory relocated to the Department of Pathology, where Liston took up the position of Professor of Pathology.
Research
Liston has extensively worked in the cellular control over immune/tolerance switches, and how molecular defects in these switches can lead to pathologies ranging from autoimmunity and primary immunology to diabetes and neuropathology. By researching a broad range of pathologies, and using both patient samples and animal models, Liston’s research is able to identifying the common cellular pathways to pathology. Liston has been awarded the Francqui Chair, the Eppendorf Prize and fellowship to the Academy of Medical Sciences and the Royal Society of Biology. Liston currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Immunology & Cell Biology.
Other Professional Activities
Beyond his research interests, Liston works on improving equality of opportunity within the scientific career structure. Liston writes extensively about science careers: how early career scientists can navigate the academic career pathway and succeed in starting their own lab, and what should be done to make scientific careers more equitable. Liston openly discusses his experiences as a scientist-parent, and works extensively on communicating science to children, with the online game VirusFighter and the illustrated children’s books “All about Coronavirus”, “Battle Robots of the Blood” and “Maya’s Marvellous Medicine”.
