Professor Simon Foote produced the first physical map of a human chromosome and subsequently a map of the entire human genome while working at the Genome Center at the Whitehead Institute, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After his return to Australia, he headed up the Genetics and Bioinformatics Division at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne, before taking up the Directorship of teh Menzies Research Institute in 2005. Professor Foote's research involves the study of genes involved in susceptibility to disease and he has an outstanding record in spinning out commercial opportunities from human health biotechnolgy research.