Whitaker

Iain read medicine at Cambridge University (Trinity Hall College) and completed a sub-internship at Harvard Medical School followed by specialised plastic, reconstructive and aesthetic surgery training in Yorkshire, Wales, Sweden, USA, Australia and France.

He completed prestigious microsurgical fellowships in Melbourne via the Rowan Nick’s Award, the most prestigious of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons international awards, and facial reconstruction in Paris via the European Association of Plastic Surgeons Young Plastic Surgeon Scholarship. Iain was a locum consultant in Cambridge before returning to Wales in 2012.

In 2018, Iain completed a Royal College of Surgeons/Cutlers Surgical Fellowship in Ear & Facial Reconstruction in Paris with Dr Francoise Firmin. Following his return, he was invited to give evidence to the Future of Surgery Commission at the Royal College of Surgeons, who subsequently reported that his two major research (3D bioprinting & big data) were selected as two of the four areas of technological development likely to make the greatest impact over the next two decades. Iain has edited several reference text books and published over 200 papers with an H index of 35 and an i10 index of 87. Iain is currently on the Specialist Advisory Committee for plastic surgery as the Academic Lead and Specialty Editor for Frontiers in Surgery.

Iain was awarded a Royal College of Surgeons Pump Priming award in 2019 via the Carol Rumney Legacy to support his research into 3D Bioprinting Cartilage for Facial Reconstruction and has been invited as a Visiting Professor at The Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, North Carolina, USA and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA. He will continue his research collaboration with the MGH via a Walter B Cannon Visiting Scholarship from 2019-2021.

In the news:

Health and Care Research Wales invests in leaders across Wales to shape the research of the future (April 2022)

"To be able to put glasses on and them not slip off would make a difference to me" (March 2022)

Royal visit to life-changing research facility in Swansea (March 2022)

Girl in Wales set to be first to benefit from pioneering research into 3D bioprinting using human cells (July 2021)

Barking up the right tree (November 2019)