Thalia Eley is Professor of Developmental Behavioural Genetics at King’s College London. She is an international leader in paediatric anxiety and depression research and has contributed enormously to understanding the aetiology and development of emotional disorders, especially anxiety in children and adolescents.
Her research has led to important novel discoveries with regards to mechanisms and what contributes to intergenerational transmission of emotional problems. More recently she has become an international leader in the genetics of anxiety, having published the largest genome-wide association study of adult anxiety, which confirmed the importance of common genetic variants. Importantly given the stigma and misunderstanding around mental health, she has readily engaged with the media around the topic of anxiety.