Biography

As a PhD student at Harvard in the late 1970s, Jim Kaufman identified and characterized the class II molecule HLA-DR encoded in the human major histocompatibility complex (MHC). A model based on a chance observation led to his life-long interest in the evolution of immunity. At the Basel Institute for Immunology, he looked for MHC molecules and genes in many organisms. Eventually, he focused on the chicken, the only non-mammalian vertebrate for which there was extensive information on pathogens, vaccines, immune responses, genetics and development. The work continued at the Institute for Animal Health in Compton, where he showed the importance of genomic organisation and gene co-evolution in the evolution of the MHC, along with performing various senior management roles. For twelve years, he was the Professor of Comparative Immunogenetics at the University of Cambridge, developing scenarios for the origin and evolution of the adaptive immune system of jawed vertebrates, and trying to further understand responses to infectious pathogens in chickens and other birds, Tasmanian devils and humans. From 2020, he became the Chair of Immunology at the University of Edinburgh, continuing to work on chickens and other birds, rabbits and bats.