BAppSc, PhD, FRMS, FFSc (RCPA)

Associate Professor Murray Killingsworth is currently Principal Scientist at the Electron Microscopy Laboratory of New South Wales Health Pathology, Liverpool. He is a Conjoint Associate Professor of the South Western Sydney Clinical School, University of New South Wales (UNSW) and a Conjoint Associate Professor of the School of Medicine, University of Western Sydney (UWS).

Murray obtained his PhD from UNSW School of Pathology (now Medical Sciences) in 1989 based on ultrastructural studies of ageing and degeneration of the human retina. He trained in electron microscopy under Dr Mel Dickson and Professor Athol Lykke at UNSW and then worked with ophthalmologists Dr Shirley Sarks and Dr John Sarks at Lidcombe Hospital from 1981 to 1989 completing his PhD. He then spent a further 7 years with this group where his post-doctoral work contributed to defining the role of chronic inflammation in the pathogenesis of age-related macular degeneration.

His research interests continue to focus on the cell biology of chronic inflammatory processes in retinal disease, renal disease and cancer. In 2010 Murray was awarded a Founding Fellowship of the Faculty of Science of the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia.

Key publications:

• Killingsworth MC. Angiogenesis of choroidal neovascularization secondary to age-related macular degeneration. Graefe’s Archive Clin Exp Ophthalmol 1995; 233(6): 313-323
• Killingsworth MC, Sarks JP, Sarks SH. Macrophages related to Bruch’s membrane in age-related macular degeneration. Eye 1990; 4: 613-621
• Killingsworth MC. Age-related components of Bruch’s membrane in the human eye. Graefe’s Arch Clin Exp Ophthalmol 1987; 225: 406-412
• Sarks SH, van Driel D, Maxwell L, Killingsworth MC. Softening of drusen and subretinal neovascularisation. Trans Ophthalmol Soc UK 1980; 100: 414-422