Vice-Chancellor, University of Tasmania
Professor Peter Rathjen is the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Tasmania.
Prior to his appointment to UTAS, Prof Rathjen was the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of Melbourne. He was Dean of Science at that university and before that he was Foundation Executive Dean, Faculty of Sciences at the University of Adelaide. As a biochemist, he has specialised in embryonic stem (ES) cell research.
Prof Rathjen, with his wife Dr Joy Rathjen, established an internationally recognised research programme into stem cell biology and stem cell therapies.
Professor Rathjen is an Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Adelaide, is the Victorian patron of the Australian Institute of Political Science: Tall Poppies Campaign, and was the winner of the inaugural South Australian Premier's Science Excellence Award in the category of Research Leadership in 2005.
Professor Rathjen studied as an undergraduate in the Department of Biochemistry at Adelaide University. As a 1985 Rhodes Scholar Prof Rathjen undertook a DPhil at Oxford University, studying mobile genetic elements in yeast and mammals. He began investigating the molecular regulation of ES cell differentiation during a two-year postdoctoral position at Oxford.
He returned to Adelaide University in 1990 as a lecturer. In 1995 he was promoted to the chair of the Department of Biochemistry and in 2000 he became head of the new Department of Molecular Biosciences.