Goodnow joins Garvan as deputy director

Professor Chris Goodnow has joined the Garvan Institute of Medical Research as deputy director. He has also accepted The Bill and Patricia Ritchie Foundation Chair.

At Garvan he will head the Immunogenomics Group to investigate the underlying genetic causes of immune disorders, particularly autoimmune diseases.

Goodnow, who is current president of the Australasian Society for Immunology, leaves the Division of Immunology at the John Curtin School of Medical Research, Australian National University (ANU). He joined ANU in 1997 as Professor and director of the Medical Genome Centre, leading its development into a Major National Research Facility, the Australian Phenomics Facility.

While at Garvan, Goodnow will continue to pursue his interest in how the immune system makes its decisions, in particular how it distinguishes between ‘self’ and ‘non-self’.

He will take full advantage of the powerful whole genome sequencers at The Kinghorn Cancer Centre as well as in-house capacity to engineer mice with specific genetic mutations.

At the same time, he hopes to establish a network of people working in the field of autoimmunity to combine clinical expertise with genomic and molecular immunology research.