Prof Richard Banati
Staff Profile
Role at ANSTO
Professor Richard Banati is an internationally recognised scientist with interdisciplinary research interests in the brain’s innate immune system and the development of advanced medical imaging for the non-invasive study of brain function. Since 2008, Professor Banati has held an Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) Distinguished Researcher Fellowship in a cross-institutional life sciences team that has unique access to a range of methodologies, including live cell imaging, impedance spectrometry, quartz crystal microbalance measures, and protein structure analysis by x-ray and neutron-based techniques.
More recently, Professor Banati and his colleagues have embarked on research into the interaction of radiation and living matter and make use of nuclear analytical techniques to study environmental health.
Richard Banati is Professor and Foundation Chair of Medical Radiation Sciences at the University of Sydney, Director of the Ramaciotti Centre for Brain Imaging at the Brain & Mind Research Institute (BMRI) and Director, University of Sydney node of the National Imaging Facility.
His early scientific career commenced at the Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry (Neurobiology) in Munich, Germany. Prior to taking up his current post at the University of Sydney in January 2004, he was Principal Fellow in the Department of Neuropathology, Imperial College, London and the MRC-Cyclotron Unit, Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith Hospital, London. His work is highly cited and published in specialist journals as well as high-impact multi-disciplinary journals, such as The Lancet, and Annals of Neurology and Brain.
The research of Professor Banati and his colleagues has received recognition through the bi-annual Award of the German league for Research into Alzheimer's Disease, Award for Interdisciplinary Research of Society for Radiation Research (Gesellschaft fur Strahlenforschung GSF, Munich), the New Frontiers in Science Presentation 1998 at the Royal Society (London), and the 2003 JSPS Professorial Award by Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Professor Banati also spoke at the Eureka Ambassador Evening in 2010.
In 2008, Professor Banati joined the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) as a Distinguished Research Fellow. He is now a member of the ANSTO Executive Team, the ANSTO LifeSciences Management Team and supports the CEO in the focus areas of strategic research and national and international collaborations & partnerships.