Sharon Lewin is the inaugural Director of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, a joint initiative of the University of Melbourne and the Royal Melbourne Hospital. She holds the position of Melbourne Laureate Professor at the University of Melbourne and in 2022 became the inaugural Director of the Cumming Global Centre for Pandemic Therapeutics, a mission-driven, global research centre to enable rapid design and development of therapeutics for future pandemics. She is a consultant infectious diseases physician for Alfred Hospital and Royal Melbourne Hospital and a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Practitioner Fellow.
As an infectious-disease physician and virologist, her research focuses on why HIV persists on treatment and developing clinical trials aimed at finding a cure. She has published over 360 publications and given over 100 major invited talks on HIV cure. She has also established a new research program on diagnostics and treatments for COVID-19, under her leadership Doherty scientists were the first to isolate and share the SARS COV2 virus outside of China. Her recognitions include Melburnian of the Year (2014) and inclusion among Clarivate’s Highly Cited Researchers (2019). She served as President of the International AIDS Society and is now Immediate Past President.