John Pickup is Emeritus Professor of Diabetes and Metabolism at King’s College London and Guy’s Hospital, London, UK. He read physiology for his first degree, followed by a PhD in endocrine pharmacology and then completed his clinical medical training, all at the University of Oxford, UK. After a fellowship at the Endocrine Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, and an appointment at the Hammersmith Hospital in London he moved to Guy’s Hospital, London becoming successively senior lecturer, reader and professor. He has also been Visiting Professor at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow since 2005. His awards include the Banting Lectureship of Diabetes UK, the Diabetes Leadership Award of the Diabetes Technology Society the British Medical Association Book of the Year Award for the Textbook of Diabetes, which he co-edited, and an honorary degree of Doctor of Science from the University of Strathclyde. John Pickup has a long-standing interest in the development and clinical application of novel technology for the improved management of diabetes, starting from the development of insulin pump therapy through to in vivo glucose sensors. His current research focuses on insulin pump therapy and continuous glucose monitoring in clinical practice, developing novel fluorescence approaches to glucose sensing, applications of nanomedicine in diabetes, and activation of the innate immune system and inflammation as a cause of type 2 diabetes and its complications.