Martyn Cobourne graduated from King’s College London in 1990 and undertook specialty training in orthodontics at King’s College Hospital (1994-97). He was then awarded a Medical Research Council Clinical Training Fellowship and undertook a period of basic science research in Paul Sharpe’s laboratory at Guy’s Dental Hospital, which led to the award of a PhD (1998-2001). This research won the Senior Colgate Prize of the British Society of Dental Research in 2000.

Following a period of further clinical training, he was appointed as Senior Lecturer and Honorary Consultant in Orthodontics at King’s College London in 2004 and promoted to Professor of Orthodontics in 2011.

His research is primarily focused on the role of molecular signalling pathways during early development of the head and face, with a particular focus on the role of Sonic hedgehog signal transduction.

However, he is also interested in the effectiveness of contemporary orthodontic treatment interventions and has led a number of randomised clinical trials investigating the efficiency of orthodontic treatment.

He has published over 130 peer-reviewed articles and is the author of two successful orthodontic textbooks, the Handbook of Orthodontics (Elsevier) and Clinical Cases in Orthodontics (Wiley).

His research has won a number of prizes, including the British Orthodontic Society Chapman Prize for best research article (2014, 2016 and 2018) and the American Association of Orthodontists Dewel Award for best clinical research in 2019.

He has been invited to present a number of prestigious lectures, including the Charles Tomes Lecture at the Royal College of Surgeons, England (2015) and the Northcroft Lecture at the British Orthodontic Society Conference in 2018.

He was a Trustee and Director of Research at the British Orthodontic Society (2012-2016) and has been Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Orthodontics since 2012. In 2017 he became a full member of the USA North Atlantic Division of the Angle Society of Orthodontists and was elected to the Board of Faculty of Dental Surgeons at the Royal College of Surgeons of England.