John Aitchison, PhD, is Co-Director of the Center for Global Infectious Disease Research (CGIDR) at Seattle Children’s Research Institute and a Professor of Pediatrics at University of Washington. He is a founding faculty member of the Institute for Systems Biology, where he pioneered systems biology approaches for cell biology, so called systems cell biology. After 15 years at ISB, he became the Chief Science Officer, and subsequently President, of Seattle Biomedical Research Institute (dba Center for Infectious Disease Research) where he led the implementation of systems biology approaches to understand and battle infectious diseases, primarily those of developing countries. He led the merger between Seattle Biomedical Research Institute with Seattle Children’s to further advance systems biology and systems medicine.  

He received his PhD in Biochemistry from McMaster University, Canada. He performed postdoctoral research in the Laboratory of Cell Biology at the Rockefeller University under the guidance of Professor Guenter Blobel (Nobel Laureate, 1999). Aitchison holds part-time, adjunct or affiliate faculty positions at the Institute for Systems Biology, University of Washington (Biochemistry), the University of Alberta (Cell Biology) and the University of British Columbia (Biochemistry).