Alan Aderem is a biologist, specializing in immunology and cell biology. Dr. Aderem's particular focus is the innate immune system, the part of the immune system that responds generically to pathogens.
Dr. Aderem is currently director of Seattle Biomed. Aderem co-founded the Institute for Systems Biology with Leroy Hood and Ruedi Aebersold in 2000. The Institute for Systems Biology was one of the first research institutes in the world focused on developing a systems approach to understanding biology, health, and disease.
Aderem is from South Africa. He received a PhD from the University of Cape Town in 1979. In 1996, he was appointed Chair of the Parliamentary Review Commission of the South African Medical Research Council, and reappointed in 2001. Aderem's interests embrace diseases important to South Africa, including AIDS and tuberculosis.
Aderem's early work in the innate immune system was conducted at The Rockefeller University in New York. In 1996, he joined the faculty of the The University of Washington, where he held appointments in the Departments of Immunology and Medicine.