Professor Chris Ponting stands as a distinguished leader in computational biology and medical bioinformatics, currently serving as Chair of Medical Bioinformatics and Principal Investigator at the MRC Human Genetics Unit within the University of Edinburgh's Institute of Genetics and Cancer. His academic journey began with a foundation in physics, earning his B.A. in Physics from the University of Oxford in 1986 followed by an M.Sc. in Physics from the University of British Columbia in 1988. Ponting completed his doctoral training at Oxford, receiving his DPhil in Biophysics in 1992 with research focused on structural studies of plasminogen. After a formative year at the National Centre for Biotechnology Information in Bethesda, he established a distinguished research career at the University of Oxford before transitioning to his current leadership position at the University of Edinburgh in 2016.
Professor Ponting's research group has made seminal contributions across protein science, evolutionary biology, and genomics, with early work discovering numerous important protein domain families that became foundational to structural biology. He provided pioneering evolutionary analyses for mammalian genomes while leading protein analysis teams for the landmark human and mouse genome sequencing projects. His research established the critical finding that 8.2% of the human genome is evolutionarily constrained and therefore likely functional, reshaping understanding of genomic architecture. Ponting's laboratory continues to drive innovation through the DecodeME genetics study, which investigates the genetic basis of myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), while advancing methodologies in single-cell biology and machine learning applications in genomics.
Beyond his research program, Professor Ponting has profoundly shaped his field through influential editorial and leadership roles, having served on the editorial boards of Genome Research, Genome Biology, and several other leading journals. He co-founded CGAT, an MRC-funded training center, and currently leads the Edinburgh Cross-Disciplinary Fellowship Programme, demonstrating his commitment to nurturing the next generation of computational scientists. Recognized as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and Member of the European Molecular Biology Organisation, Ponting continues to advance interdisciplinary research at the intersection of (bio)physics, noncoding RNA biology, and evolutionary genomics. His current research focuses on disease-causal DNA variants, ME/CFS genetics, machine learning applications, and thymus single-cell biology, positioning his laboratory at the forefront of medical bioinformatics innovation.
