Professor Alistair Forrest is an expert in transcriptomic (gene expression) analysis. As scientific coordinator of the FANTOM5 consortium, he led an international team that generated global maps of human promoters, enhancers, microRNAs and long non-coding RNAs. These landmark resources are widely used to build transcriptional regulatory networks, interpret regulatory genetic variation and identify cancer biomarkers. He also pioneered computational approaches for predicting cell-to-cell communication networks based on curated ligand receptor interactions and led the development of ConnectomeDB.

Professor Forrest holds an NHMRC Level 2 Investigator Grant and is Head of the Systems Biology and Genomics Laboratory and Associate Director for Scientific Strategy at the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research in Perth, Western Australia.

Since returning to Australia in 2015, he has established statewide collaborative capacity in cancer single cell genomics, securing major co-investment from the Cancer Research Trust, the Australian Cancer Research Foundation and Cancer Council WA.

His current research programme integrates single cell, single nucleus and spatial transcriptomics with functional tumour slice models to dissect the cellular architecture of ovarian cancer and identify robust predictors of treatment response and patient outcome.