Marta Korbonits MD, PhD, DSc, FRCP

Marta Korbonits graduated in Medicine in Budapest and undertook her early clinical training at the Internal Medicine Department of the Postgraduate Medical School, Budapest. She joined the Department of Endocrinology at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital under the mentorship of Professors Ashley Grossman and Michael Besser. Her MD concentrated on the effects of growth hormone secretagogues on hypothalamic hormone release, while her Ph.D. studies explored the nature and causes of pituitary tumorigenesis. She was awarded an MRC Clinician Scientist Fellowship and commenced studies that produced novel insights into ghrelin physiology and genetics. Her findings related to the regulation of the metabolic enzyme AMPK by ghrelin, cannabinoid and glucocorticoid opened a new aspect of hormonal regulation of metabolism. She is working on novel aspects of the genetics of endocrine tumors as well as the metabolic consequences of hormonal imbalances. She is a Professor of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Centre Lead of Endocrinology, and Deputy Director of the William Harvey Research Institute at Barts and the London School of Medicine, Queen Mary University of London, and Honorary Consultant at Barts Health NHS Trust.

Professor Korbonits continues to integrate human studies alongside laboratory-based research and has pioneered several projects in translational medicine. Over the last decade, her major research focus involves the clinical and scientific aspects of familial isolated pituitary adenomas. In addition to her basic research, she looks after patients with endocrine diseases in St. Bartholomew’s Hospital and undertakes wide-ranging undergraduate and postgraduate teaching activities as well as supervision of MSc and Ph.D. students. Professor Korbonits has received several awards, including the Nicholas T. Zervas Lectureship in Pituitary and Neuroendocrine Disorders at Massachusetts General Hospital (2010), the Society for Endocrinology Medal (2013), the Endocrine Society’s Delbert Fischer award (2015), the Hadden Lecture Prize, Irish Endocrine Society (2017), the Harrison Lecture Prize, Endocrine Society of Australia (2017) and the Estelle Wolfson award from the Royal College of Physicians (2018). She has been invited to Professor at the University of Colorado in 2019 and had the KROC Visiting Professorship Award, Mayo Clinic in 2020, and is the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh keynote lecturer, Edinburgh in 2020. She supports the endocrine community’s learned societies: served as the Conference Program Secretary for the Society for Endocrinology, was a Board member for the Pituitary Society and European Neuroendocrine Society, and Chair of the Science Committee of the European Society of Endocrinology. She is a current or past Editorial Board member of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, Journal and Neuroendocrinology, Pituitary and Journal of Endocrinology and Associate Editor of Scientific Reports, Annals of Human Genetics, and the Journal of the Endocrine Society. She is a member of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Fellowship Committee and Head of the Society of Endocrinology Leadership program.