Professor Antony Basten was appointed Professor of Immunology at the University of

Sydney in 1975, at the remarkably young age of 36.

His continuing contribution to the science of immunology and the art of clinical immunology is significant and represent a chronicle of the progress in his chosen field in Australia, and internationally. These achievements have been recognised by his appointment as an Officer in the General Division of the Order of Australia for services to Medicine (AO), his election to Fellowship of the Australian Academy of Science (FAA) and to Fellowship of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences (FTSE)and an award from the Prime Minister of Australia of a Centenary Medal for service to Australian society and science in immunology. He was the recipient of the Inaugural Wellcome Australia Medal for ‘distinguished discovery and its demonstrated use’, and a Rotary International Award for Vocational Excellence. In addition, the Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy (ASCIA) has established the Basten Oration, in honour of his contributions to this society, which he served as its inaugural President, amongst several other roles.

 Among the highlights of Professor Basten’s scientific career, are the award of one of the first NHMRC Program Grants, his listing in 1980 (as one of only seven Australians) in the top 1,000 Scientists from all disciplines world-wide (adjudged by Citation Index), his Directorship of the Clinical Immunology Research Centre, University of Sydney, followed by his appointment as the inaugural Executive Director of the Centenary Institute of Cancer Medicine and Cell Biology.

Professor Basten has been the Rubbo Orator at the Australian Society for Microbiology, the Florey Lecturer of the Royal Society, London, and has delivered the Burnet Oration at the 25 th Annual Meeting of the Australasian Society of Immunology. Between 1987 and 1989 he was Chairman of The National AIDS Task Force and then the Chief Commonwealth medical and scientific advisor on AIDS. In addition, he has been an invited speaker at over 100 international scientific meetings and has served on the Editorial Boards of 11 international scientific journals, and on WHO Steering Committees on Vaccines for Fertility Regulation and Immunology of Mycobacteria. In 2000 he was Chairman of the International Congress of Allergology and Clinical Immunology when it was held in Sydney.

Publications in international journals by Professor Basten number 302 with over 22,000 citations.

 Throughout his career, Professor Basten has directed clinical medical services at all levels, as Head of the Department of Clinical Immunology and Allergy, Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Area Director of Clinical Immunology and Allergy for the Central Sydney Area Health Service and as Head of the Division of Medicine at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney. Elsewhere in NSW, he has been a Consultant Immunologist at the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children, Concord General Repatriation Hospital, Royal North Shore Hospital and Royal Newcastle Hospital.

To date, over 50 students have completed their degrees and numerous physicians have completed their clinical immunology training under his supervision, with eight of them now full Professors, seven Staff Specialists at major teaching hospitals, three Senior Lecturers , while one has become a Vice Chancellor and another Dean of a medical school. Nine of them have received awards in the Order of Australia.

Currently, Professor Basten is an Emeritus Professor at Sydney University, a Conjoint Professor of Medicine at the University of New South Wales and an Emeritus Fellow at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research. Following his retirement from The Centenary Institute, He spent a year at Trinity College, Cambridge, UK as a Visiting Fellow Commoner with an appointment at the Medical Research Council’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology at Cambridge University.

His research interests have included studies on the regulation of immune responses in health and diseases including allergies and clinical trials of immunomodulatory agents in cancer, multiple sclerosis and deep vein thrombosis. In 2012 he co-chaired an Australian Academy of Science’s working party on vaccination and contributed to two subsequent updates of the Academy’s Q&A on vaccination.