Since April 2026, Professor Martin Widschwendter has led the Daffodil Centre at Cancer Council NSW into a new phase focused on precision cancer prevention — using biological and lifestyle data to stop cancer before it starts, and to diagnose developing cancers earlier.

It is the latest chapter in a career built at the intersection of surgery and translational science. Trained in gynaecology and breast surgery in Austria, Widschwendter carried out formative research at the University of Southern California under epigenetic pioneers Professors Peter Jones and Peter Laird before moving to London, where he trained and practised as a gynaecological oncology surgeon. There he founded and led the Women’s Cancer Translational Research Centre at UCL and served for over ten years as Director of the Department of Women’s Cancer. He also held a Guest Professorship at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, before founding and directing the European Translational Oncology Prevention and Screening (EUTOPS) Institute in Austria.

An internationally recognised pioneer in women’s cancer prevention and a global leader in translational epigenetics, Widschwendter has spent almost three decades studying how DNA methylation and other epigenetic changes shape cancer risk. His research has produced clinically validated tools, including the WID™ (Women’s cancer risk IDentification) tests, for predicting and detecting gynaecological and breast cancers earlier and more precisely – tests, like the WID®-easy test for early endometrial cancer detection, that are now beginning to be integrated into cancer prevention pathways across Europe and the UK. He has served as principal investigator on major grants from the European Research Council, Horizon 2020 and the Swedish Research Council.

His contributions have been recognised with, among other honours, the Cross of Merit of the Province of Tyrol (2018), Fellowship ad eundem of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (FRCOG, 2016), and the Rise Up for Breast Cancer Prevention Award from the University of California, San Francisco (2024).