Ole Petersen, CBE, FRS, the founding editor-in-chief of Function, is a professor at Cardiff University’s School of Biosciences in Wales. Petersen pioneered single channel current recordings in epithelial cells, discovering hormone-evoked, messenger-mediated ion channel activation and voltage-activation of epithelial ion channels. This led to the now generally accepted concept of how ion channels control exocrine fluid secretion.

Among Petersen’s accolades, he is an elected Fellow of The Royal Society and a Commander of the Order of the British Empire. He has been awarded Academia Europaea’s 2020 Gold Medal for Services to European Science.