Professor James Stirling CBE FRS became the first Provost of Imperial College London in August 2013.
Before joining Imperial, Professor Stirling was the Head of the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge. He completed an undergraduate degree in mathematics at Peterhouse, Cambridge, graduating with first class honours in 1975 and obtained his PhD in Theoretical Particle Physics in 1979.
After periods of research in the USA, Cambridge and the European Centre for Particle Physics (CERN) in Geneva, he was appointed to a lectureship at Durham in 1986. He was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 1989, to Reader in 1990 and to Professor in Mathematical Sciences and Physics in 1992.
In 2000, Professor Stirling became the first Director of the new Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology (IPPP) at Durham University. From 2001 to 2003, he served as the first Chair of the PPARC Science Committee, the research council's top-level scientific advisory committee.
In 2005, Professor Stirling was appointed Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research at Durham University, a post which he held for three years before moving to Cambridge to take up the Jacksonian Professorship in September 2008.
In recognition of his contribution to particle physics research, he was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society in May 1999. He was awarded a CBE in the 2006 New Years Honours list, for services to science. In 2015, he was awarded a Fellowship of the City & Guilds of London Institute in recognition of his professional and personal achievements.
He has been a member of the Physics Panel in two Research Assessment Exercises (2001 and 2008) and was Deputy Chair of the 2008 panel. He served on the Council of the Royal Society from 2007 to 2008 and on the Council of the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) from 2009 to 2015.