Professor Nick Talbot FRS is Executive Director of The Sainsbury Laboratory.  His research is  focused on the biology of plant diseases. He utilises a range of cell biology, genetics and genomics approaches in his research.  He is interested in fungal infection-related development and understanding how fungi are able to invade plant tissue and suppress plant immunity. Prof Talbot's main contributions have been associated with understanding the biology of plant infection by the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae.

Professor Talbot has authored more than 160 scientific papers and reviews and received research fellowships from EMBO and the Nuffield Foundation. Professor Talbot was an ERC Advanced Investigator (2013-18) and also holds grants from BBSRC, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, The Leverhulme Trust and the Halpin Scholars Programme. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology (FRSB) in 2010, a member of EMBO in 2013, a member of the Academia Europaea in 2014 and a Fellow of The Royal Society (FRS) in 2014.

Professor Talbot served as Chair of the Board of Directors of Rothamsted Research (2009 – 14) and is currently an Advisor on Plant Sciences to the Gatsby Charitable Foundation and a member of the John Innes Council. 

Before joining The Sainsbury Laboratory, Prof. Talbot was Deputy Vice Chancellor for Research and Impact (2010-18), Head of the School of Biosciences (2004-10) and Professor of Molecular Genetics (1999-2018) at the University of Exeter. He was also Chair of the GW4 Research Alliance (Universities of Bristol, Cardiff, Exeter and Bath) 2016-18 and Co-ordinated the South-East Wales and South West England Science and Innovation Audit (2017). 

Executive Director of The Sainsbury Laboratory

Board of Directors, Anglia Innovation Partnership 

Norwich Biosciences Institutes Executive Group