Sarah Gilbert is Professor of Vaccinology in the Nuffield Department of Medicine at the University of Oxford.
She completed her undergraduate studies at the University of East Anglia and her doctoral degree at the University of Hull.
Following four years as a research scientist at the biopharmaceutical company Delta Biotechnology she joined Oxford University in 1994 and became part of the Jenner Institute (within the Nuffield Department of Medicine) when it was founded in 2005.
Her chief research interest is the development of viral-vectored vaccines that work by inducing strong and protective T and B cell responses.
She works on vaccines for many different emerging pathogens, including influenza, Nipah, MERS, Lassa, Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever, and in 2020, initiated the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine project.
Working with colleagues in the Jenner Institute research labs, the Clinical Biomanufacturing Facility, and Centre for Clinical Vaccinology and Tropical Medicine, all situated on the Old Road Campus in Oxford, she is able to take novel vaccines from design to clinical development.
Sarah has a particular interest in the rapid transfer of vaccines into manufacturing and first in human trials.
She is the Oxford Project Leader for ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, a vaccine against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, with approval for use in many countries around the world.
In June 2021 she was made a Dame in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List.