From 1986-91 Thomas Preiss studied Chemistry at the Philipps-Universität, Marburg (Germany) and the University of Bristol (UK), followed by PhD work (1992-95) at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (UK). He spent the next seven years (1995-2002) as a postdoctoral scientist at the European Molecular Biology Laboratories (EMBL), Heidelberg (Germany), in parallel also completing his Habilitation in Biochemistry [Permission to teach at the professorial level] at the Medical Faculty of the Universität Heidelberg (Germany). In 2002 he became a laboratory head at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute in Sydney and held conjoint appointments at the University of New South Wales (Senior Lecturer, then Associate Professor). Since 2011 he is a Professor of RNA Biology at ANU/JCSMR.