Inaugural Lecture hosted by the School of Physics

Abstract: I will highlight some of the major contributions physics has made to understanding the biological world. These efforts have often been highly collaborative, requiring expertise across many fields to make progress. I will focus specifically on how soft matter physics has helped us to understand some of the most current problems in biology and biopharmaceutical science, from Covid vaccines to the fundamentals of cell biology. Where this has had most impact on my research is in understanding protein phase transitions. These are associated with disease pathogenesis, for example in cataract disease or sickle cell anaemia, but they also occur as part of normal biological processes, such membraneless organelle formation in cells. I will describe some of the progress in these areas and discuss the new challenges on the horizon.