Justin Yerbury

Justin John Yerbury (1974-2023) was an Australian molecular biologist born in Wollongong, New South Wales, who became a Professor in Neurodegenerative Disease at the University of Wollongong after multiple family members were diagnosed with a genetic form of motor neurone disease in the late 1990s. He earned first-class honors and a doctorate from the University of Wollongong and published more than 100 research articles on protein misfolding and neurodegenerative disease. He continued his research after his own motor neurone disease diagnosis in 2016, eventually communicating through eye-gaze software, and received Member of the Order of Australia honors in 2020 and the University of New South Wales Eureka Prize for Scientific Research in 2022. He died in 2023 from the disease he had spent his career studying.