Professor Alastair McEwan

Biography

Alastair McEwan is Pro-Vice Chancellor (Researcher Development) at the University of Queensland, responsible for research training and development of academic and professional staff undertaking and engaged with research. He was Dean, UQ Graduate School from 2013-2021 and continues a strong commitment to development of doctoral candidates in his role as Convenor, Australian Council of Graduate Research.

Professor McEwan graduated from the University of Leeds with a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry and was awarded his PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Birmingham in 1984. He held a Science and Engineering Research Council (NATO) Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Royal Society University Research Fellowship at the University of Oxford before moving to a lectureship at the University of East Anglia. Professor McEwan joined the University of Queensland in 1993 and was Head of the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences from 2005-2010 and Deputy Dean, Faculty of Science from 2011-12.

Professor McEwan has a particular interest in transferable skill development for researchers and articulation of the value that researchers can bring to end-users across all sectors of the economy and society through knowledge exchange and employment. His scientific research spans bacterial physiology and pathogenesis and the development of novel antimicrobial strategies involving transition metal ions.