William Wisden is Professor of Molecular Neuroscience at Imperial College London. He has made several pioneering contributions to our knowledge of ion channels and neurotransmitter receptors and their functions and adaptations in the brain. As a consequence of this work he is one of the world's most highly-cited neuroscience researchers. Wisden helped elucidate the molecular and functional diversity of several key receptor-channels of fundamental medical importance, including GABA and glutamate receptors and the TASK potassium channel. Working across disciplines with pharmacologists, physiologists, mathematicians and physicists, he has developed a collaborative style needed to make progress in systems neuroscience. His remarkable body of work has combined several landmark discoveries as well as the development of key techniques in neuroscience.