Dr TJ Higgins is a plant scientist who is interested in delivering advances made in plant biotechnology to sustainably feeding an increasing world population.

Dr Higgins worked at the Australian National University as a postdoctoral fellow and for many years and then in the CSIRO Plant Industry Division. He also spent a sabbatical year at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Washington. His work is focused on food legumes because of their nutritive value as well as their roles in crop rotations. Dr Higgins has received a number of awards, including the Goldacre Award from the Australian Society of Plant Physiologists, the Pharmacia-LKB Biotechnology Medal from the Australian Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and a Centenary Medal from the Australian Government.

Dr Higgins has strong international scientific collaborations in Africa and Indi, and works closely with colleagues in Nigeria, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Malawi and India where he has mentored them in agriculture and food security by working alongside them on projects of interest to those countries. He also helped build capacity in African and Indian scientists involved in risk assessment and in the establishment of regulatory systems for the oversight of genetically modified organisms, and has long term and on-going collaborations with scientists in the USA and Europe.