Clare Elwell is a Professor of Medical Physics and Vice Dean for Impact for the Faculty of Engineering Sciences at University College London (UCL). She obtained her BSc. in Physics with Medical Physics in 1988 from the University of Exeter, where she also completed her MPhil (1991). She gained a PhD from UCL in 1995 describing a novel method for measuring brain blood flow. She is Director of the Near Infrared Spectroscopy Research Group at UCL and develops novel optical systems for monitoring and imaging the human brain. Her research projects include studies of autism, acute brain injury in adults, children and infants, sports performance, migraine and malaria.

She leads the Brain Imaging for Global Health (BRIGHT) project, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, to investigate the impact of malnutrition on infant brain development. This project delivered the first functional brain imaging of infants in Africa and is now developing brain function for age curves for Gambian and UK infants from birth to 24 months of age with the aim of informing targeted interventions to improve long term neurocognitive outcome. She established the Globalfnirs initiative (www.globalfnirs.org) to support the application of NIRS in global health projects.

Clare is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, founder member and Past President of the Society for Functional Near Infrared Spectroscopy, and President of the London International Youth Science Forum. She is Founder and Trustee of the charity Young Scientists for Africa (YoSA, www.yosa.org.uk).