Dr Anna Barnes FIPEM trained in medical physics in Glasgow and became a Clinical Scientist in 1999 after completing her training in Biomedical Engineering and Equipment Management and a PhD in advanced Neuroimaging in neurology and psychiatry. She continued her career in advanced neuroimaging; first 2 years at the Institute of Neurology in Glasgow, 2 years at New York University PET imaging centre for movement disorders, 1 year at GE Healthcare radiopharmaceutical development team, 2 years at Columbia University NY in the fMRI psychology lab and 5 years at University of Cambridge Brain Mapping Unit developing imaging biomarkers for psychiatry applications.

In 2012 she took up an NHS post at UCLH as the Lead Clinical Scientist tasked to introduce the novel combined PET and MRI scanner in the newly built UCH Macmillan Cancer Centre. During this time she also represented the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine as their VP for external relations 2013/16, and most recently president elect 2023/25, and has held 2 NIHR senior fellowships.

In 2020 Anna represented the Medical Physics Imaging workforce for IPEM by serving on the National Imaging Optimisation Delivery Board – part of the Transforming Imaging Services initiative – during the CoViD-19 pandemic for which she was awarded the President’s Gold Medal for services to IPEM. She was the Regional Chief Healthcare Scientist for all the SE region for NHS-England and Improvement 2020/22 and is currently the director of King’s College Technology Evaluation working predominantly on evaluation of AI enabled digital health technologies for NICE and NHS-England.