GARY ANDERSON

Advisor, Clinical Translation

Gary Anderson is a pharmacologist and immunologist at the University of Melbourne where he is a Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics and founding Director of the Lung Health Research Centre (LHRC), both in the Faculty of Medicine.

His research uses genetic models to find molecular mechanisms of disease induction, progression, severity, exacerbation and resolution. He works mainly on severe asthma, COPD, interstitial lung disease (ILD) and cancer. He is the author of around 200 papers and reviews. In 2008 he proposed the widely adopted 'endotype' concept (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endotype).

At the start of his career Gary worked in the Swiss Pharmaceuticals Industry (Sandoz and Ciba-Geigy, now Novartis) for about 10 years and maintains close links with major bio/pharmaceutical companies. His basic and applied translational research has contributed to the discovery and development of a number of new medicines for respiratory disease that are widely used in current clinical practice. 

He co-founded, and served as Research Director of, the Cooperative Research Centre for Chronic Inflammatory Diseases (CRC-CID), and has served at executive level on the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) of Australia. He is a recipient of the Research Medal, and was elected a Fellow, of the Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ) for his contribution to lung disease research. He served on the Board of Directors of TSANZ, where he chaired the Research Committee, and served on the Council of the Lung Foundation Australian. In 2015 he was elected a Fellow of the European Respiratory Society (FERS).