Professor Mark Rees is Head of Neurology Research at the Institute of Life Science, Swansea University Medical School. His research interests focus on the underlying causes of neurological disorders including the epilepsies, movement disorders, multiple sclerosis, sudden death syndromes and data-linkage studies. He gained his PhD at the Department of Molecular Haematology, University of Wales College of Medicine (1989-1993) and worked with Sir Mike Owen in Neuropsychiatric Medicine, Cardiff University as a MRC-sponsored Postdoctoral Fellow (1994-1999). In 1999, Professor Rees began a six-year academic post at the University of Auckland Medical School, New Zealand as a Senior Lecturer in Neurology & Cardiac Genetics.
He joined Swansea University in 2004 as a Professor of Genomics / Neuroscience and established the Wales Epilepsy Research Network (WERN 2005-2015). Professor Rees was Chair of the Epilepsy Research-UK (ERUK) Scientific Advisory Committee in London between 2011-2014 and is now a Trustee of ERUK. He is a Fellow of the Learned Society for Wales (FLSW), the Royal College of Pathologists (FRCPath), the Royal College of Physicians (FRCPE), and the Royal Society of Biology (FRSB). He received a DSc from Swansea University in 2012 and is also Honorary Fellow of the Association of British Neurologists. Professor Rees’s team were winners of the 2015 Swansea University Impact Awards in Health & Wellbeing.
In addition to running a large ILS-1-based neurology / genomics research group, Professor Rees is Chair of the Swansea University Collaborative Partnerships Board and Impact Lead for the Wales Gene Park. He is a Senior Leader for Health & Care Research Wales and the Swansea lead for the HCRW BRAIN Unit and Swansea University Biobanks Committee. He has published over 110 peer-reviewed publications and has attracted over £21m of research investments from Wales, UK and international sources over the past 20 years.